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MoLsterpieces 

In ft ' 

of ^ ^ 

American 
Eloquence 

[CHRISTIAN HERALD SELECTION] 



... WltK Introdxiction by . . . 

JULIA WARD HOWE 



NEW YORK 
THE CHRISTIAN HERALD 

LOUIS KLOPSCH, Proprietor 
1900 



86430 

Library of Congreae 

Iwu Copies Received 
DEC. 101900 

A Copyrigftt entry 

SECOND COPY 

0«(iv«racl to 
OHOEK DIVISION 

DEC 11 1900 



T^^ 



V\ 



Coi'ViuGHT, 1900, By Louis Klofsch 



N 






o 



INTRODUCTION. 




HE historians of antiquity attached so much importance to the utterances 
of the great men of whom they wrote, that they were fain to make 
such report as they could of the orations pronounced by these person- 
ages, on occasions of pubhc interest. Where full knowledge in this 
regard was unattainable, the historians themselves, it is supposed, 
composed such addresses as such men, under the given circumstances, 
would have been likely to make. 

The orations of Demosthenes and Cicero have, indeed, been preserved for 
us in their entirety; and continue to this day to hold an important place in 
Greek and Latin classics. In addition to these, Thucydides, Livy, and Tacitus 
hand down to us many eloquent sentences; which may have been correctly, even 
if imperfectly, reported. Nothing, indeed, can bring the people of other times 
so much within the comprehension of later generations as can the record of 
what their eminent men were moved to say in the great crises of their public 
life. The Latin proverb tells us that: "Verba volant. Liter a seripta manet." 
But in the recorded orations, the flying word is made to remain, the fleeting 
impression reproduces itself; we live for the moment the life of days long 
vanished. 

As Americans, we have especial occasion to feel an interest in the volume 
herewith presented. Eloquence does much to build up the life of free peoples. 
The words uttered by patriots in our early history were prophetic of the destiny 
of a Nation fated to play a new part in the great drama of the world's record. 
The indignant protest of James Otis against the Writs of Assistance, imposed 
upon the Colonies by the Mother Country; the burning words of Patrick Henry, 
from which fugitive slaves in our own time have taken to themselves the 
sentence: . "Give me liberty, or give me death!" the weighty utterances of 
Samuel Adams, Alexander Hamilton, and Thomas Jefiferson — do they not 
bring back to us the very walls within which the fateful pleadings were made? — 
the " Old Church " in Richmond where Patrick Henrv' stood, the State House 
of Boston, preserved from vandal destruction by the prayers of Massachusetts 



2 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

women; the beloved Hall given by Peter Faneuil, still standing, and still 
made to resound with the music of free speech; Independence Hall, in Phila- 
delphia, where the charter of our new faith was signed and sealed; and many 
another locality, consecrated by heroic associations. And, far more precious 
than this dead architecture, is the living temple of our Statehood, the brave 
building of thought and of art which has been raised upon the foundation of 
our fathers, a fabric strong and beautiful. To the youth of our country we 
may well say of these old-time statements of Right and Duty: 

" Grapple them to thy heart with hooks of steel." 

But our volume passes from these legacies of the immortal past to the 
wonderful record of our own century, one in which the new theories were put 
upon trial. The maxims enunciated by the fathers, the rules laid down, were 
no doubt very high-sounding; but could a stable government be raised on 
such a plane, by such a system? 

We soon see an old-world poison working into the wholesome veins of the 
new body-politic. Slavery, fastened upon us while we were yet in our cradle, 
/became a source of irreconcilable differences. On the one hand, it was seen 
/that no country could be called free in which man could buy and sell his 
brother man. On the other hand, it became evident that an irresponsible 
tyranny could not be permitted to overrun the domain pledged to the upholding 
of free institutions. And in time the inevitable contest came; and in the end 
was settled for the ultimate advantage of both parties. 

The present volume preserves for our instruction the arguments which 
make evident the steps of this progress; at first, so painful, in the end, so tri- 
umphant. The voices which awoke the echoes of our own halls of Congress 
with fiery threats, with prophetic admonitions, the mistaken pleading which 
urged on the war, and the counter pleading which kept in sight the true issue, 
yes, and the simple, wise eloquence of the Martyr President's parting address — 
all this is given to the public in the work now offered to it. 

Among the treasures of this collection, I must not omit to mention 
Wendell Phillips's speech on the murder of Lovejoy, the memorable burst of 
eloquence which won for him the spurs of his early knighthood. Here we have 
Daniel Webster's reply to Hayne, in which he gives his interpretation of the 
scope and character of our Government — and, later on, Theodore Parker's 
trenchant analysis of Webster's public life. We are glad also to find Henry 
Ward Beecher's remarkable address given in Liverpool during our war, when 
the Mother Country looked coldly upon us, and the great audience scarcely 
accorded to the eminent orator a decent hearing. Among the earlier of the 



INTRODUCTION. 3 

speeches here brought together, I am led to ponder the words of Samuel 
Adams, less familiar perhaps to some of us than others of his name: "Truth 
loves an appeal to the common sense of mankind." " Our fathers threw off 
the yoke of Popery in religion; for you is reserved the honor of leveling the 
Popery of politics." " This day (August i, 1776) I trust the reign of political 
protestanism will commence." 

The study of these historic documents is much needed in our day, when 
American men and women, with fair opportunities of culture and educatio.n, 
often show a lamentable ignorance of the history and original spirit of our 
Government. When I undertook to write an introduction to the present vol- 
ume, and to review the matter therein contained, I had a very imperfect notion 
of its value. Since then, I have found in the perusal of these pages, much 
food for thought. As I read, the mighty issues of the century just passed rise 
up before me, the terrible problem whose solution could not be deferred, and 
cannot now be changed. 

In the orations here presented I find that the walls of our National Capitol 
had resounded with many angry debates before the question of slavery so 
widely divided the North from the South. Civil liberty, philosophers agree, 
is not an original attribute of man's nature, but a result of wise and high dispo- 
sitions. Such a result cannot be attained without the exhibition of many 
differences of opinion. The freedom of speech and of the press to which we 
were pledged from the start allowed these differences to encounter each other 
in broad daylight and upon a field of unusual extent. Fortunately they have 
proved themselves to be discords leading to solution, and as the processes of 
question, discussion, and final settlement have gone on, the general harmony 
has risen to a higher and fuller diapason. 

From this fact of the past we .may hopefully draw the happy inference that 
our dififerences, individual and national, will more and more tend to settle 
themselves by the scale of reason and that the better acquaintance with the 
principles essential' to social and civil well-being will insure a growing interest 
in the prevalence and final establishment of those principles. 

The America of to-day rushes panting in the pursuit, not of wealth only, 
but of the imperial power which wealth confers. The multi-millionaire has 
become the most popular ideal among us, the man who can most enrich himself 
at the expense of the community. Next to him ,in the popular idolatry, comes 
the man who can delude the multitude with specious arguments and phrases 
of high promise. In some parts of our country, evil passions raging in undisci- 
plined minds arouse opposition to every just law. The victim of popular fury 
is led to the stake and burned there ; while Judgment, in her calm temple, waits 



4 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

with sword and balance to condemn and to execute, but waits in vain. How 
can these things be? Is the finger of our fate receding on the dial? Are we 
insensibly creeping back, here to the reign of savage violence, there to that of 
barbaric splendor? We may well exclaim: " Forbid it, Heaven!" 

The true glory of our country is not seen in our wealthy men and women 
who patrol the capitals of Europe, craving the notice and applause of a society 
very different from our own. Their way may be traced by the gold that they 
spill, but these traces will vanish like the crumbs scattered by one in a fa-'ry- 
tale, to mark his path, and at once devoured by the birds of the forest. Even 
the monumental splendor of their edifices shall pass away: 

" And, like the baseless fabric of a vision, 
Leave not a rack behind." 

Our true glory is in the brave words which in our midst have been spoken 
for human right and freedom, and in the brave deeds which have responded 
to them. The Mother of the Gracchi when asked to show her jewels, pointed 
to her sons and said: "These are my jewels." So may America point to her 
true children who have done her work, and borne, with her burdens, a great 
part of the obligations of civilized humanity. 

^schylus represents the children of Agam.emnon as standing beside his 
tomb, and invoking his aid in the vindication of his memory. Even thus, beside 
the records of these fathers of our Commonwealth, we may appeal for present 
help to their immortal spirits, the essence of which still lives and glows in their 
undying words. 

What a creature is man that he can so project his living thought into ages 
which have never seen his face nor heard his voice! Not vainly is this power 
granted him. Roman Horace could say: " Non omnis moriar." " I shall not 
wholly perish." And you, noble guardians of the people's conscience, you 
who so often lifted up your voice in the face of danger and rude defiance, you 
are not dead. Your spirits abide with us in the words which God gave you 
when and as they were needed. Emerson has said: 

" One accent of the Holy Ghost 
The heedless world has never lost." 

And we, your children, heedless and unthinking as we may be, will not 
suffer your great promise to remain unfulfilled. We will vindicate your honor 
with our own. 

JULIA WARD HOWE. 



-<f>^ 



INDEX TO ADDRESSES. 



^Hy 



Abraham Lincoln 

Amendment, The Fifteenth .... 

American Independence 

American Indians 

American System 

An Author's Soldiering 

Annexation of Texas 

A Plea for Compromise 

Apple Tree Speech 

Army Bill 

Assault upon Sumner 

Assistance, Writs of 

Author, Discounts of an . . . . . 

Ben Hill, Death of 

Bill, The Army 

Bill, The Militia . 

Black Man 

Black Man, The Problem of the . . 

British Treaty 

Capital Punishment 

Chinese Mission 

Chinese Question 

Compromise, A Plea for 

Compromise, Necessity of ... . 
Conflict, The Irrepressible .... 
Constitution, The Federal .... 
Contested Election Case of Patterson 

vs. Carmack 

Crime Against Kansas 



Page 

Frederick Douglass .... 256 

Francis P. Blair 251 

Samuel Adams 24 

Joseph Story 369 

Henry Clay 92 

Samuel L. Clemens .... 438 

Thomas H. Benton 123 

Henry Clay 163 

Roscoe Conkling 365 

Roscoe Conkling 276 

Preston S. Brooks 174 

James Otis 17 

Samuel L. Clemens 428 

John J. Ingalls 377 

Roscoe Conkling 276 

John Randolph 44 

Frederick Douglass .... 473 

H. W. Grady 332 

Fisher Ames 36 

Edward Livingston 493 

Thomas H. Benton .... 120 

James G. Blaine 273 

Henry Clay 163 

Rufus Choate iii 

William H. Seward .... 182 

Alexander Hamilton Page . . 30 

John M. Allen 322 

Charles Sumner 165 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Cross of Gold . . ' 

Cuba, Slavery and the Annexation of. 

Death of Ben. Hill 

Death of Douglas 

Discounts of an Author .... 

Douglas, Death of 

Drinker, The Moderate .... 

Duty of Scholarship .... 

East, Rural Life in the 

Education of the People 

Election Case of Patterson vs. Car- 
mack, The Contested 

Experiment, The Republican . . . 

Farewell Address 

Fathers, The Pilgrim 

Federal Constitution 

Fifteenth Amendment 

Finger of God 

Foot's Resolution 

Force Bill, Nullification and the . . 

Foreign Intervention 

freedom of the Press, The Murder of 
Lovejoy and the 

Freedcem, Religious , 

General Jackson's Fine 

Gettysburg Address 

God, The Finger of 

Gold, The Cross of 

Greatness, The Power of .... 

Hayne, Reply to 

Henry of Navarre Speech .... 

Higher Law 

Impeachment of President Johnson . 

Inaugural Address 

Inaugural Address 

Inaugural Address, Lincoln's Second . 

Independence, American 

Indians, The American 



Page 

William Jennings Bryan . . . 465 

Joshua R. Giddings . . . . 141 

John J. Ingalls 377 

Lyman Trumbull 235 

Samuel L. Clemens .... 428 

Lyman Trumbull 205 

John B. Gough 423 

Wendell Phillips 383 

Irving Bacheller 441 

Edward Everett 102 

John M. Allen 322 

James Madison 437 

Jefferson Davis 210 

Robert Charles Winthrop . . 151 

Alexander Hamilton .... 30 

Francis P. Blair 251 

T DeWitt Talmage, D.D. . . 410 

Robert Y. Hayne 55 

John C. Calhoun 80 

John A. Dix 132 

Wendell Phillips 86 

Lewis Cass 145 

Silas Wright 116 

Abraham Lincoln 233 

T. DeWitt Talmage, D.D. . . 410 

William Jennings Bryan . . . 465 

Theodore Parker 391 

Daniel Webster 62 

Judge West 37^ 

\\'illiam H. Seward .... 138 

Benjamin F. Butler .... 248 

Jefferson Davis 213 

Thomas Jefferson 40 

Abraham Lincoln 238 

Samuel Adams , 24 

Joseph Story 369 



INDEX TO ADDRESSES. 



Intervention, Foreign 

Irrepressible Conflict 

Jackson's Fine, General 

Johnson, Impeachment of President . 

Judge, The Upright 

Kansas-Nebraska Bill 

Kansas, The Crime Against . 

Law, The Higher 

Lincoln, Abraham 

Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address . 

Literature, Sioience and 

Lovejoy and ' the Freedom of the 
Press, The Murder of 

Maine Dead 

Man, The Black 

M-assachusetts and the Sumner As- 
sault 

Memorial Address . 

Mexican War ....'.... 

Militia Bill 

Mission, Chinese 

Mission of the Rep»ublic 

Moderate Drinker 

Mother's Wonder 

Murder of Lovejoy and the Freedom 
of the Press 

Nebraska-Kansas Bill 

Necessity of Compromise 

Necessity of War . 

New South 

Nullification and the Force Bill . . 

P^^ting of the Ways 

Party Spirit 

People. The Education of the . . . 

Philippines 

Philippines, The 

Pilgrim Fathers 

Polygamy 



John A. Dix . . 
William H. Seward 
Silas Wright . 
Benjamin F. Butler 
Rufus Choate . . 
Stephen Arnold Douglas 
Charles Sumner . 
William H. Seward 
Frederick Douglass 
Abraham Lincoln 
James Kent 

Wendell Phillips . 
Ro1>ert G. Cousins 
Frederick Douglass 

Anson Burlingame 
James G. Blaine . 
Thomas Corwin . 
John Randolph . 
Thomas H. Benton 
William H. Seward 
John B. Gough . 
Phillips Brooks, D.D 

Wendell Phillips . . 
Stephen Arnold Douglas 
Rufus Choate . 
Patrick Henry 
Henry W. Grady . 
Joftm C. Calhoun 
Richard P. Bland . 
George Washington 
Edward Everett . 
George F. Hoar . . 
Henry Cabot Lodge 
Robert Charles Winthrop 
George F. Edmunds . . 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Power of Greatness 

Powers of War and Peace . . . . 
President Johnson, Impeachment of . 
Problem of the Black Man . . . . 

Problsm, The Race 

Prophecy, The Voice of 

Providence, The Soul's 

Punishment, Capital 

Question, The Chinese 

Race Problem 

Railroads and Recreation . . . . 

Reaping, Sowing and 

Reconstruction 

Recreations, Railroads and . . . . 

Religious Freedom 

Remonetization of Silver . . . . 

Reply to Hayne 

Republican Experiment . . . . .. 

Republic, Mission of the . . . . 

Resolution, Foot's 

Rural Life in the East . . . . . 

Science and Literature 

Secession 

Secession and the States of the Union. 
Self-Government, Strength of . . . 

Self, The Solitude of 

Shield, The Stainless 

Silver 

Silver 

Silver, Remonetization of ... . 
Slavery and the Annexation of Cuba. 

Slavery, The System of 

Soldiering, An Author's . . . . 

Solitude of Self 

Soul's Providence 

South, The New 

Sowing and Reaping 

Spoils System 











Page 


Theodore Parker 391 


John Quincy Adams . 






• 75 


Benjamin F. Butler 






. 248 


Henry W. Grady . . 






• 332 


Henry Watterson . . 






. 328 


Abraham Lincoln . . 






. 187 


Ralph Waldo Emerson 






• 478 


Edward Livingston 






• 490 


James G. Blaine . . . 






• 273 


Henrv Watterson . . 






• 328 


Chauncey M. Depew . 






39.S 


John B. Gough . . . 






418 


Henrv Winter Davis . 






240 


Chauncey M. Depew . 






395 


Lewis Cass 






145 


James G. Blaine . 








2.59 


Daniel Webster . 








62 


James Madison . 








437 


William H. Seward 








246 


Robert Y. Havne 








55 


Irving Bacheller 








441 


James Kent 








380 


Alfred Iverson 








199 


Benjamin Wade . 








191 


Henrv Ward Beecher . 






385 


Elizabeth Cadv Stanton 






455 


James A. Garfield . . 






361 


Thomas B. Reed . . 






313 


William Bourke Cockran 






309 


James G. Blaine .... 






259 


Joshua R. Giddings . . 






141 


Henry Ward Beecher . . 






216 


Samuel L. Clemens . . 






438 


Elizabeth Cadv Stanton . 






455 


Ralph Waldo Emerson . 






478 


Henry W. Grady . . . 






339 


John B. Gough .... 






418 


George William Cu 


rtis . 






292 



INDEX TO ADDRESSES. 



9 



Stainless Shield, The 

Strength of Self-Government . . . 
Sumner Assault, Massachusetts and 

the 

Sumner, The Assault upon .... 

System of Slavery 

System, The American 

Texas, Annexation of • . 

Treaty, The British .... . . 

Union, Secession of the States of the . 

Upright Judge 

Valedictory 

Voice of Prophecy 

War and its Conduct 

War and Peace, The Powers of . . 

War of 1812 

War, The Mexican 

War, The Necessity of 

Ways, The Parting of the .... 

White Life for Two 

Wonder, The Mother's 

Writs of Assistance 



Page 

James A. Garfield 361 

Henry Ward Beecher .... 385 

Anson Burlingame 178 

Preston Brooks 174 

Henry Ward Beecher .... 216 

Henry Clay 92 

Thomas H. Benton 123 

Fisher Ames 36 

Benjamin Wade 191 

Rufus Choate 388 

Henry Clay .114 

Abraham Lincoln 187 

Clement L. Vallandigham . . 227 

John Quincy Adams .... 75 

Henry Clay 49 

Thomas Corwin 127 

Patrick Henry 20 

Richard P. Bland 317 

Frances E. Willard .... 445 

Phillips Brooks, D.D 403 

James Otis 17 




So on the tip of his subduing tongue 
All kinds of arguments and questions deep, 
All replication prompt and reason strong, 
For his advantage still did wake and sleep 
To make the weeper laugh, the laugher weep, 
He had the dialect and different skill, 
Catching all passion in his craft of will. 

^ ^ ^t ^ :^ ^' 

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue . . . . 
Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus, but use all gently; for in the very 
torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, the whirlwind of passion, you must acquire and beget a 
temperance that may give it smoothness .... Be not too tame neither, but let your 
own discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the action; witli this 
special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature; for anything so overdone is 
from the purpose. 

— Shakespeare. 



INDEX TO ORATORS. 



Adams, John Quincy ..... The Powers of War and Peace . 

Adams, Samuel American Independence . . . . 

Allen, John M The Contested Election Case of 

Patterson vs. Carmack. 

Ames, Fisher The British Treaty .... 

Bacheller, Irving- Rural Life in the East . . 

Beecher, Henry Ward . . . . The System of Slavery . . 

Strength of Self-Government 
Benton, Thomas H Chinese Mission .... 

Annexation of Texas . 
Blaine, James G. ...... . The Remonetization of Silver 

The Chinese Question. 

Memorial Address . . . 

Blair, Francis P. . The Fifteenth Amendment 

Bland, Richard P The Parting of the Ways. 

Brooks, D.D., Phillips The Mother's Wonder . 

Brooks, Preston S. . . . . . . The Assault upon Sumner 

Bryan, William Jennings .... The Cross of Gold . . . 

Burlingame, Anson Massachusetts and the Sumner As- 
sault . . 

Butler, Benjamin F Impeachment of President Johnson 

Calhoun, John C Nullification and the Force Bill . 

Cass, Lewis , Religious Freedom 



Page 

75 
24 

322 

36 

441 
216 

385 
120 
124 
259 
273 
280 

251 
317 
403 
174 
465 

178 

248 

80 

146 



12 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Page 



Choate, Rufus Necessity of Compromise in Poli- 
tics Ill 

The Upright Judge. . . . . . 388 

Clay, Henry The War of 1812 49 

The American System 92 

A'aledictory 114 

A Plea for Compromise .... 163 

Clemens, Samuel L. (Mark Twain) The Discounts of an Author . . . 428 

An z\uthor's Soldiering 438 

Cockran, William Bourke . . . Silver 307 

Conkling, Roscoe The Army Bill 276 

The Apple Tree Speech .... 365 

Corwin, Thomas The Mexican War 127 

Cousins, Robert G The Maine Dead 347 

Curtis, George William .... The Spoils System 292 

Davis, Henry Winter Reconstruction 240 

Davis, Jefferson Farewell Address 209 

Inaugural Address 213 

Depew, Chauncey M Railroads and Recreation . . . 395 

Dix, John A Foreign Intervention 132 

Douglas, Stephen Arnold .... The Kansas-Nebraska Bill ... 154 

Douglass, Frederick Abraham Lincoln 256 

The Black Man 473 

Edmunds, George F Polygamy 303 

Emerson, Ralph Waldo .... The Soul's Providence .... 478 

Everett, Edward The Education of the People . . 102 

Garfield, James A Peace 234 

The Stainless Shield 361 

Giddings, Joshua R Slavery and the Annexation of 

Cuba 141 

Gough, John B Sowing and Reaping 418 

The Moderate Drinker .... 423 

Grady, Henry W The Problem of the Black Man . 332 

The New South 339 

Hamilton, Alexander The Federal Constitution. ... 30 

Hayne, Robert Y Foot's Resolution 55 

Henry, Patrick The Necessity of War 20 

Hoar, George F The Philippines 35<^ 



INDEX TO ORATORS. 13 

Page 

Ingalls, John J Death of Ben. Hill 377 

Iverson, Alfred Secession 199 

Jefferson, Thomas Inaugural Address ...... 40 

Kent, James ........ Science and Literature 380 

Lincoln, Abraham The Voice of Prophecy 187 

The Gettysburg Address .... 233 

Second Inaugural Address . . . 238 

Livingston, Edward Capital Punishment 490 

Lodge, Henry Cabot The Philippines 355 

Madison, James The Republican Experiment . . 437 

Morrill, Justin S The Remonetization of Silver . . 266 

Otis, James The Writs of Assistance .... 17 

Parker, Theodore The Power of Greatness .... 391 

Phillips, Wendell The Murder of Lovejoy and the 

Freedom of the Press .... 86 

The Duty of Scholarship . . . 383 

Randolph, John The Militia Bill 44 

Reed, Thomas B Silver 312 

Seward, William H The Higher Law 138 

The Irrepressible Conflict . . . 182 

The Mission of the Republic . . 246 

Stanton, Elizabeth Cady .... The Solitude of Self 455 

Story, Joseph The American Indians .... 369 

Sumner, Charles The Crime Against Kansas . . 165 

Talmage, D.D., T. DeWitt . . . The Finger of God 410 

Trumbull, Lyman The Death of Douglas .... 205 

Twain, Mark (Samuel L. Clemens) The Discounts of an Author . . . 428 

An Author's Soldiering .... 438 

Vallandigham, Clement L. . . . War and its Conduct 2.2^ 

Wade, Benjamin F. ..... Secession, and the States of the 

Union 191 

Washington, George Party Spirit 435 

Watterson, Henry The Race Problem 328 

Webster, Daniel Reply to Hayne 62 

West, Judge W. H The Henry of Navarre Speech . 372 

Willard, Frances E A White Life for Two .... 445 

Winthrop, Robert Charles . . . The Pilgrim Fathers 151 

Wright, Silas General Jackson's Fine .... 116 



— 1>^ 



INDEX TO PORTRAITS, 



Mi^- 



Adams, John Ouincy 
Adams, Samuel 
Allen, John M. . 
Ames, Fisher 
Bacheller, Irving 
Beecher, Henry Ward 
Benton, Thomas H. 
Blaine, James G. . 
Blair, Francis P. . 
Bland, Richard P. 
Brooks, D.D.. Phillips 
Bryan, William Jennings 
Burlingame, Anson 
Butler, Benjamin F. 
Calhoun, John C. 
Cass, Lewis . 
Choate, Rufus 
Clay, Henry 
Clemens, Samuel L. 
Cockran, William Bourke 
Conkling, Roscoe , 
Corwin, Thomas . 
Cousins, Robert G. 
Curtis, George William 
Davis, Henry Winter . 
Davis, Jefferson . 
Depew, Chauncey M. 
Dix, John A. 
Douglass, Frederick 
Douglas, Stephen Arnold 
Edmunds, George F. . 
Emerson, Ralph Waldo 



Page 

77 
25 
323 
37 
443 
217 
121 
261 
253 
319 
405 
467 
179 

249 
81 

147 
112 

51 
429 

309 

277 

129 

348 

293 
241 
210 

397 
133 

257 
155 
303 
479 



INDEX TO PORTRAITS. 



15 



Everett; Edward . 

Garfield, James A. 

Gidding-s, Joshua R. 

GoUgh, John B. . 

Grady, Henry W. 

Hamilton, Alexander 

Hayne, Robert Y. 

Henry, Patrick 

Hoar, George F. 

Ingalls, John J. . 

Iverson, Alfred 

Jefferson, Thomas 

Kent, James 

Lincoln, Abraham 

Livingston, Edward 

Lodge, Henry Cabot 

Madison, James . 

Morrill, Justin S. . 

Otis, James 

Parker, Theodore 

Phillips, Wendell 

Randolph, John . 

Reed, Thomas B. 

Seward, William H. 

Stanton, Elizabeth Cady 

Stor}'-, Joseph 

Sumner, Charles . 

Talmage, D.D., T. DeWitt 

Trumbull, Lyman 

Twain, Mark (Samuel L. Clemens) 

Vallandigham, Clement L. 

Wade, Benjamin E. 

Washington, George 

Watterson, Henrv 

Webster, Dam'el . 

West, Judge W. H, . . 

Willard, Fr?nces E. 

Winthrop, Robert Charles 

Wright, Silas 




James Otis. 



The Writs of Assistance. 

By JAMES OTIS, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1725, died 1783.) 




AY IT PLEASE YOUR HONORS: I was desired by one of the 
court to look into the books, and consider the question now before 
them concerning writs of assistance. I have accordingly consid- 
ered it; and now appear, not -only in obedience to your order but 
likewise, in behalf of the inhabitants of this town, who have presented 
another petition, and out of regard to the liberties of the subject. 
And I take this opportunity to declare, that, whether under a fee or not (for in 
such a cause as this I despise a fee), I will to my dying day oppose, with all the 
powers and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the 
one hand and villainy on the other, as this writ of assistance is. 

It appears to me the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most de- 
structive of English liberty and the fundamental principles of law, that ever was 
found in an English law-book. I must, therefore, beg your honors' patience 
and attention to the whole range of an argument, that may, perhaps, appear 
uncommon in many things, as well as to points of learning that are more remote 
and unusual ; that the whole tendency of my design may the more easily be per- 
ceived, the conclusions better descend, and the force of them be better felt. I 
shall not think miich of my pains in this cause, as I engaged in it from principle.' 
I was solicited to argue this cause as Advocate-General; and, because I would 
not, I have been charged with desertion from my ofBce. To this charge I can 
give a very sufficient answer. I renounced that office, and I argue this cause 
from the same principle ; and I argue it with the greater pleasure, as it is in favor 
of British liberty, at a time when we hear the greatest monarch upon earth de- 
claring from his throne that he glories in the name of Briton, and that the privi- 
leges of his people are dearer to hini than the most valuable prerogatives of his 



i8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

crown ; and as it is in opposition to a kind of power, the exercise of which in 
former periods of history cost one King of England his head, and another his 
throne. I have taken more pains in this cause than I ever will take again; al- 
though my engaging in this and another popular cause has raised much resent- 
ment. But I think I can sincerely declare, that I cheerfully submit myself to 
every odious name for conscience' sake; and from my soul I despise all those 
whose guilt, malice, or folly has made them my foes. Let the consequences be 
what they will, I am determined to proceed. The only principles of public con- 
duct, that are worthy of a gentleman or a man, are to sacrifice estate, ease, health, 
and applause — and even life — to the sacred calls of his country. 

These manly sentiments, in private life, make the good citizens ; in public 
life, the patriot and the hero. I do not say that, when brought to the test, I shall 
be invincible. I pray God I may never be brought to the melancholy trial; but 
if ever I should, it will be then known how far I can reduce to practice principles 
which I know to be founded in truth. In the meantime, I will proceed to the 
subject of this writ. 

Your honors will find in the old books, concerning the ofKice of a justice of 
the peace, precedents of general warrants to search suspected houses. But in 
more modern books, you will find only special warrants to search such and such 
houses, specially named, in which the complainant has before sworn that he 
suspects his goods are concealed; and will find it adjudged that special warrants 
only are legal. In the same manner, I rely on it, that the writ prayed for in this 
petition, being general, is illegal. It is a power that places the liberty of every 
man in the hands of every petty officer. I say, I admit that special writs of as- 
sistance, to search special places, may be granted to certain persons on oath ; 
but I deny that the writ now prayed for can be granted, for I beg leave to make 
some observations on the writ itself, before I proceed to other acts of Parliament. 
In the first place, the writ is uiinrrsal, being directed " to all and singular jus- 
tices, sheriffs, constables, and all other officers and subjects; " so that, in short, 
it is directed to every subject in the King's dominions. Every one with this 
writ may be a tyrant; if this commission be legal, a tyrant in a legal manner; 
also, may control, imprison, or murder any one within the realm. In the next 
place, it is perpetual; there is no return. A man is accountable to no person for 
his doings. Every man may reign secure in his petty tyranny, and spread terror 
and desolation around him, until the trump of the archangel shall excite different 
emotions in his soul. In the third place, a person with this writ, in the daytime, 
may enter all houses, shops, etc., at will, and command all to assist him. 
Fourthly, by this writ, not only deputies, etc., but even their menial servants, 
are allowed to lord it over us. What is this but to have the curse of Canaan 



THE WRITS OF ASSISTANCE. 



19 



with a witness on us ; to be the servant of servants, the most despicable of God's 
creation? Now one of the most essential branches of English liberty is the 
freedom of one's house. A man's house is his castle ; and whilst he is quiet, he 
is as well guarded as a prince in his castle. This writ, if it should be declared 
legal, would totally annihilate this privilege. Custom-house officers may enter 
our houses when they please ; we are commanded to permit their entry. Their 
menial servants may enter, may break locks, bars, and everything in their way ; 
and whether they break through malice or revenge, no man, no court can in- 
quire. Bare suspicion without oath is sufificient. This wanton exercise of this 
power is not a chimerical suggestion of a heated brain. I will mention some 
facts. Mr. Pew had one of these writs, and when Mr. Ware succeeded him, he 
indorsed this writ over to Mr. Ware ; so that these writs are negotiable from 
one officer to another; and so your honors have no opportunity of judging the 
persons to whom this vast power is delegated. Another instance is this : Mr. 
Justice Walley had called this same Mr. Ware before him, by a constable, to 
answer for a breach of the Sabbath-day acts, or that of profane swearing. As 
soon as he had finished, Mr. Ware asked him if he had done. He replied, " Yes." 
" Well, then," said Mr. Ware, " I will show you a little of my power. I com- 
mand you to permit me to search your house for uncustomed goods ; " and went 
on to search the house from the garret to the cellar ; and then served the con- 
stable in the same manner ! But to show another absurdity in this writ : if it 
should be established, I insist upon it every person, by the 14th Charles Second, 
has this power as well as the custom-house officers. The words are : " it shall 
be lawful for any person or persons authorized," etc. What a scene does this 
open ! Every man prompted by revenge, ill-humor, or wantonness, to inspect 
the inside of his neighbor's house, may get a writ of assistance. Others will 
ask it from self-defense; one arbitrary exertion will provoke another, until so- 
ciety be involved in tumult and in blood. 

(Delivered before the Superior Court of Massachusetts, February, 1761.) 





20 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Necessity of War. 

By PATRICK HENRY, of Virginia. 

(Born 1736, died i799-) 



R PRESIDENT: No man thinks more highly than I do of the patri- 
otism, as well as abilities, of the very worthy gentlemen who have 
just addressed the House. But different men often see the same 
subject in different lights ; and, therefore, I hope that it will not be 
thought disrespectful to those gentlemen, if, entertaining, as I do, 
opmions of a character very opposite to theirs, I shall speak forth 
my sentiments freely and without reserve. This is no time for ceremony. The 
question before the House is one of awful moment to this country. For my 
own part, I consider it as nothing less than a question of freedom or slavery; 
and in proportion to the magnitude of the subject, ought to be the freedom of 
the debate. It is only in this way that we can hope to arrive at truth, and fulfil 
the great responsibility which we hold to God and our country. Should I keep 
back my opinions at such a time, through fear of giving offense, I should con- 
sider myself as guilty of treason toward my country, and of an act of disloyalty 
toward the Majesty of Heaven, which I revere above all earthly kings. 

Mr. President, it is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We 
are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth, and listen to the song of that 
syren till she transforms us into beasts. Is this the part of wise men, engaged 
in a great and arduous struggle for liberty ? Are we disposed to be of the 
number of those who, having eyes, see not and, having ears, hear not the things 
which so nearly concern their temporal salvation? For my part, whatever an- 
guish of spirit it may cost, I am willing to know the whole truth ; to know the 
worst and to provide for it. 

I have but one lamp by which my feet are guided, and that is the lamp of 
experience. I know of no way of judging of the future but by the past. And 
judging by the past, I wish to know what there has been in the conduct of the 
British Ministry for the last ten years to justify those hopes with which gentle- 
men have been pleased to solace themselves and the House ? Is it that insidious 
smile with which our petition has been lately received? Trust it not, sir; it 



22 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

will prove a snare to your feet. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed with a 
kiss. Ask yourselves how this gracious reception of our petition comports with 
these warlike preparations, which cover our waters and darken our land. Are 
fleets and armies necessary to a work of love and reconciliation? Have we 
shown ourselves so unwilling to be reconciled, that force must be called in to 
win back our love? Let us not deceive ourselves, sir. These are the imple- 
ments of war and subjugation, the last arguments to which kings resort. I 
ask gentlemen, sir, what means this martial array, if its purpose be not to force 
us to submission? Can gentlemen assign any other possible motives for it? 
Has Great Britain any enemy, in this quarter of the world, to call for all this 
accumulation of navies and armies? No, sir; she has none. They are meant 
for us ; they can be meant for no other. They are sent over to bind and rivet 
upon us those chains which the British Ministry have been so long forging. 
And what have we to oppose to them? Shall we try argument? Sir, we have 
been trying that for the last ten years. Have we anything new to offer on the 
subject? Nothing. We have held the subject up in every light of which it is 
capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble 
supplication ? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted ? 
Let us not, I beseech you, sir, deceive ourselves longer. Sir, we have done 
everything that could be done, to avert the storm which is now coming on. 
We have petitioned ; we have remonstrated ; we have supplicated ; we have 
prostrated ourselves before the throne, and have implored its interposition to 
arrest the tyrannical hands of the Ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have 
been slighted ; our remonstrances have produced additional violence and insult ; 
our supplications have been disregarded ; and we have been spurned, with con- 
tempt, from the foot of the throne. In vain, after these things, may we indulge 
the fond hope of peace and reconciliation. There is no longer any room for 
hope. If we wish to be free; if we mean to preserve inviolate those inesti- 
mable privileges for which we have been so long contending; if we mean not 
basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, 
and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object 
of our contest shall be obtained — we must fight! I repeat it, sir; we must fight! 
An appeal to arms and to the God of Hosts is all that is left us ! 

They tell us, sir, that we are weak; unable to cope with so formidable an 
adversary. But when shall we be stronger? Will it be the next week, or the 
next year? Will it be when we are totally disarmed, and when a British guard 
shall be stationed in every house? Shall we gather strength by irresolution and 
inaction? Shall we acquire the means of effectual resistance, by lying supinely 
on our backs, and hugging the delusive phantom of hope, until our enemies 



THE NECESSITY OF WAR. 



23 



shall have bound us hand and foot ? Sir, we are not weak, if we make a proper 
use of the means which the God of nature hath placed in our power. Three 
millions of people, armed in the holy cause of liberty, and in such a country as 
that which we possess, are invincible by any force which our enemy can send 
against us. Besides, sir, we shall not fight our battles alone. There is a just 
God who presides over the destinies of nations ; and who will raise up friends to 
fight our battles for us. The battle, sir, is hot to the strong alone ; it is to the 
vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, sir, we have no election. If we were 
base enough 'to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is 
no retreat, but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their 
clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston ! The war is inevitable — and 
let it come! I repeat it, sir; let it come! 

It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry peace, peace; 
but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps 
from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms ! Our 
brethren are already in the field ! Why stand we here idle ? What is it 
that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so 
sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Al- 
mighty God ! I know not what course others may take ; but as for me, give me 
liberty, or give me death ! 

(Being the World Famous Address before the Convention of Delegates, March 28, 1775.) 





24 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



American Independence. 

By SAMUEL ADAMS, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1722, died 1S03.) 

OUNTRYMEN AND BRETHREN: I would gladly have declined 
an honor to which I find myself unequal. I have not the calmness 
and impartiality which the infinite importance of this occasion de- 
mands. I will not deny the charge of my enemies, that resentment 
for the accumulated injuries of our country, and an ardor for her 
glory, rising to enthusiasm, may deprive me of that accuracy of judg- 
ment and expression which men of cooler passions may possess. Let me be- 
seech you, then, to hear me with caution, to examine without prejudice, and to 
correct the mistakes into which I may be hurried by my zeal. 

Truth loves an appeal to the common sense of mankind. Your unperverted 
understandings can best determine on subjects of a practical nature. The posi- 
tions and plans which are said to be above the comprehension of the multitude 
may be always suspected to be visionary and fruitless. He who made all men 
hath made the truths necessary to human happiness obvious to all. 

Our forefathers threw off the yoke of popery in religion; for you is reserved 
the honor of leveling the popery of politics. They opened the r')ible to all, and 
maintained' the capacity of every man to judge for himself in religion. Are we 
sufficient for the comprehension of the sublimest spiritual truths, and unequal 
to material and temporal ones? Heaven hath trusted us with the management 
of things for eternity, and man denies us ability to judge of the present, or to 
know from our feelings the experience that will make us happy. " You can 
discern," say they, " objects distant and remote, but cannot perceive those within 
your grasp. Let us have the distribution of present goods, and cut out and 
manage as you please the interests of futurity." This day, I trust, the reign of 
political protestantism will commence. We have explored the temple of royalty 
and found that the idol we have bowed down to has eyes which see not, ears 
that hear not our prayers, and a heart like the nether millstone. We have this 
day restored the Sovereign, to whom alone men ought to be obedient. He 
reigns in Heaven, and with a propitious eye beholds his subjects assuming that 
freedom of thought and dignity of self-direction which he bestowed on them. 
From the rising to the setting sun, mav his kingdom come. * * * 




Samuel Adams. 



26 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Men who content themselves with the semblance of truth, and a display of 
words, talk much of our obligations to Great Britain for protection. Had she 
a single eye to our advantage? A nation of shopkeepers are very seldom so 
disinterested. Let us not be so amused with words ; the extension of her com- 
merce was her object. When she defended our coasts, she fought for her cus- 
tomers, and convoyed our ships loaded with wealth, which we had acquired for 
her by our industry. She has treated us as beasts of burthen, whom the lordly 
masters cherish that they may carry a greater load. Let us inquire also, against 
whom she has protected us? Against her own enemies with whom we had 
no quarrel, or only on her account, and against whom we always readily exerted 
our wealth and strength when they were required. Were these Colonies back- 
ward in giving assistance to Great Britain, when they were called upon in 
^739> to aid the expedition against Carthagena? They at that time sent three 
thousand men to join the British army; although the war commenced without 
their consent. But the last war, it is said, Avas purely American. This is a vulgar 
error, which, like many others, has gained credit by being confidently repeated. 
The dispute between the Courts of Great Britain and France related to the limits 
of Canada and Nova Scotia. The controverted territory was not claimed by any 
in the Colonies, but by the Crown of Great Britain. It was, therefore, their 
own quarrel. The infringement of a right which England had, by the treaty of 
Utrecht, of trading in the Indian country of Ohio, was another cause of the 
war. The French seized large quantities of British manufactures, and took 
possession of a fort which a company of British merchants and factors had 
erected for the security of their commerce. The war was, therefore, waged in 
defense of lands claimed by the Crown, and for the protection of British prop- 
erty. The French at that time had no quarrel with America ; and, as appears 
by letters sent from their Commander-in-Chief to some of the Colonies, wished 
to remain in peace with us. The part, therefore, which we then took, and the 
miseries to which we exposed ourselves, ought to be charged to our affection 
for Britain. These colonies granted more than their proportion to the support of 
the war. They raised, clothed, and maintained nearly twenty-five thousand men; 
and so sensible were the people of England of our great exertions, that a message 
was annually sent to the House of Commons purporting : " That his majesty, be- 
ing highly satisfied of the zeal and vigor with which his faithful subjects in North 
America had exerted themselves in defense of his majesty's just rights and 
possessions, recommend it to the House, to take the same into consideration, 
and enable him to give them a proper compensation." 

But what purpose can arguments of this kind answer? Did the protection 
we received annul our rights as men, and lay us under an obligation of being 
miserable ? 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 27 

Who among you, my countrymen, that is a father, would claim authority 
to make your child a slave, because you had nourished him in his infancy? 

It is a strange species of generosity which requires a return infinitely more 
valuable than anything it could have bestowed ; that demands as a reward for 
a defense of our property, a surrender of those inestimable privileges, to the 

arbitrary will of vindictive tyrants, which alone give value to that very property. 

* * * 

Courage, then, my countrymen ! our contest is not only whether we our- 
selves shall be free, but whether there shall be left to mankind an asylum on 
earth for civil and religious liberty? Dismissing, therefore, the justice of our 
cause as incontestable, the only question is. What is best for us to pursue in our 
present circumstances? 

The doctrine of dependence on Great Britain is, I believe, generally ex- 
ploded; but, as I would attend to the honest weakness of the simplest of men, 
you will pardon me if I offer a few words on that subject. 

We are now on this continent, to the astonishment of the world, three mil- 
lions of souls united in one common cause. We have large armies, well disciplined 
and appointed, with commanders inferior to none in military skill, and superior 
in activity and zeal. We are furnished with arsenals and stores beyond our most 
sanguine expectations, and foreign nations are waiting to crown our success 
by their alliances. There are instances of, I would say, an almost astonishing 
Providence in our favor; our success has' staggered our enemies, and almost 
given faith to infidels ; so that we may truly say it is not our own arm which has 
saved us. 

The hand of Heaven appears to have led us on to be, perhaps, humble 
instruments and means in the great providential dispensation which is com- 
pleting. We have fled from the political Sodom ; let us not look back, lest we 
perish and become a monument of infamy and derision to the world i * * * 

From the day on which an accommodation takes place between England 
and America, on any other terms than as independent States, I shall date the 
ruin of this coimtry. A politic minister will study to lull us into security, by 
granting us the full extent of our petitions. The warm sunshine of influence 
would melt down the virtue, which the violence of the storm rendered more firm 
and unyielding. In a state of tranquillity, wealth, and luxury, our descendants 
would forget the arts of war, and the noble activity and zeal which made their 
ancestors invincible. Every art of corruption would be employed to loosen the 
bond of union which renders our resistance formidable. When the spirit of 
liberty, which now animates our hearts and gives success to our arms, is extinct, 
our numbers will accelerate our ruin, and render us easier victims to tyranny. 
Ye abandoned minions of an infatuated ministry — if, peradventure, any should 



28 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

yet remain among us ! — remember that a Warren and a Montgomery are num- 
bered among the dead. Contemplate the mangled bodies of your countrymen, 
and then say, what should be the reward of such sacrifices? Bid us and our 
posterity bow the knee, supplicate the friendship, and plough and sow and 
reap, to glut the avarice of the men who have let loose on us the dogs of war 
to riot in our blood, and hunt us from the face of the earth ? If ye love wealth 
better than liberty; the tranquillity of servitude, than the animating contest of 
freedom — go from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch 
down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon 
you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen. '* * * 

Some who would persuade us that they have tender feelings for future gen- 
erations, while they are insensible to the happiness of the present, are perpetually 
foreboding a train of dissensions under our popular system. Such men's reason- 
ing amovmts to this: give up all that is valuable to Great Britain, and then 
you will have no inducements to quarrel among yourselves ; or suffer your- 
selves to be chained down by your enemies, that you may not be able to fight 
with your friends. 

This is an insult on your virtue as well as your common sense. Your 
unanimity this day and through the course of the war is a decisive refutation 
of such invidious predictions. Our enemies have already had evidence that our 
present Constitution contains in it the justice and ardor of freedom, and the 
wisdom and vigor of the most absolute system. When the law is the will of 
the people, it will be uniform and coherent ; but fluctuation, contradiction, and 
inconsistency of councils must be expected under those governments where 
every revolution in the ministry of a court produces one in the state. Such being 
the folly and pride of all ministers, that they ever pursue measures directly 
opposite to those of their predecessors. 

We shall neither be exposed to the necessary convuisions of elective mon- 
archies; nor to the want of wisdom, fortitude, and virtue, to which hereditary 
succession is liable. In your hands it will be to perpetuate a prudent, active, 
and just legislature; and which will never expire until you yourselves lose the 
virtues which give it existence. 

And, brethren and fellow countrymen, if it was ever granted to mortals to 
trace the designs of Providence, and interpret its manifestations in favor of their 
cause, we may, with humility of soul, cry out: " Not unto us, not unto us, but 
to thy name be the praise." The confusion of the devices among our enemies, 
and the rage of the elements against them, have done almost as much toward 
our success as either our councils or our arms. 

The time at which this attempt on our liberties was made, when we were 
ripened into maturity, had acquired a knowledge of war, and were free from 



I 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 29 

the incursions of enemies in this country; the gradual advances of our oppressors 
enabhng us to prepare for our defense; the unusual fertility of our lands and 
clemency of the seasons; the success which at first attended our feeble arms, 
producing unanimity among our friends and reducing our internal foes to 
acquiescence — these are all strong and palpable marks and assurances, that 
Providence is yet gracious unto Zion, that it will turn away the captivity of 
Jacob. * * * 

Countrymen ! the men who now invite you to surrender your rights into 
their hands are the men who have let loose the merciless savages to riot in the 
blood of their brethren; who have dared to establish popery triumphant in our 
land; who have taught treachery to your slaves, and courted them to assas- 
sinate your wives and children. 

These are the men to whom we are exhorted to sacrifice the blessings which 
Providence holds out to us — the happiness, the dignity of uncontrolled freedom 
and independence. 

Let not your generous indignation be directed against any among us who 
may advise so absurd and maddening a measure. Their number is but few and 
daily decreased ; and the spirit which can render them patient of slavery, will 
render them contemptible enemies. 

Our Union is now complete ; our Constitution composed, established, and 
approved. You are now the guardians of your own liberties. We may justly 
address you, as the Decemviri did the Romans, and say : " Nothing that we 
propose, can pass into a law without your consent. Be yourselves, O Americans, 
the authors of those laws on which your happiness depends." 

You have now, in the field, armies sufficient to repel the whole force of your 
enemies, and their base and mercenary auxiliaries. The hearts of your soldiers 
beat high with the spirit of freedom — they are animated with the justice of 
their cause, and while they gr^asp their swords, can look up to Heaven for 
assistance. Your adversaries are composed of wretches who laugh at the rights 
of humanity, who turn religion into derision, and would, for higher wages, direct 
their swords against their leaders or their country. Co on, then, in your gen- 
erous enterprise, with gratitude to Heaven for past success, and confidence of it 
in the future. For my own part, I ask no greater blessing than to share with 
you the common danger and common glory. If I have a wish dearer to my 
soul, than that my ashes may be mingled with those of a Warren and a Mont- 
gomery, it is — that these American States may never cease to be free and inde- 
])endent ! 

(Delivered in Philadelphia, August i, 1776.) 




30 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Federal Constitution. 

By ALEXANDER HAMILTON, of New York. 

(Born 1757. died 1804.) 



AM persuaded, Mr. Chairman, that I, in my turn, shall be indulged, in 
addressing the committee. We all. in equal sincerity, profess to be 
anxious for the establishment of a republican government, on a safe 
and solid basis. It is the object of the wishes of every honest man in 
the United States; and I presume that I shall not be disbelieved, when 
I declare that it is an object of all others, the nearest and most dear to 
my own heart. The means of accomplishing this great purpose become the 
most important study which can interest mankind. It is our duty to examine 
all those means with peculiar attention, and to choose the best and most ef- 
fectual. * * * 

In the commencement of a Revolution, which received its birth from the 
usurpations of tyranny, nothing was more natural, than that the public mind 
should be influenced by an extreme spirit of jealousy. To resist these encroach- 
ments, and to nourish this spirit, was the great object of all our public and 
private institutions. The zeal for liberty became predominant and excessive. 
In forming our confederation, this passion alone seemed to actuate us, and we 
appear to have had no other view than to secure ourselves from despotism. The 
object certainly was a valuable one, and deserved our utmost attention. But, 
sir, there is another object equally important, and which our enthusiasm ren- 
dered us little capable of regarding : I mean a principle of strength and stability 
in the organization of our Government, and vigor in its operations. This purpose 
can never be accomplished but by the establishment of some select body, formed 
peculiarly upon this principle. There are few positions more demonstrable than 
that there should be in every republic, some permanent body to correct the 
prejudices, check the intemperate passions, and regulate the fluctuations of a 
popular assembly. It is evident, that a body instituted for these purposes, must 
be so formed as to exclude as much as possible from its own character, those 
infirmities and that mutability which it is designed to remedy. It is, therefore, 
necessary that it should be small, that it should hold its authority during a con- 




Alexander Hamilton. 



32 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

siderable period, and that it should have such an independence in the exercise 
of its powers, as will divest it as much as possible of local prejudices. It should 
be so formed as to be the center of political knowledge, to pursue always a 
steady line of conduct, and to reduce every irregular propensity to system. 
Without this establishment, we may make experiments without end, but shall 
never have an efficient government. 

It is an unquestionable truth, that the body of the people in every country 
desire sincerely its prosperity ; but it is equally unquestionable, that they do 
not possess the discernment and stability necessary for systematic government. 
To deny that they are frequently led into the grossest errors by misinformation 
and passion, would be a flattery which their own good sense must despise. That 
branch of administration, especially, which involves our political relations with 
foreign states, a community will ever be incompetent to. These truths are not 
often held up in public assemblies : but they cannot be unknown to any who 
hear me. From these principles it follows, that there ought to be two distinct 
bodies in our Government : one which shall be immediately constituted by and 
peculiarly represent the people and possess all the popular features ; another, 
formed upon the principle, and for the purposes, before explained. * * * 

Gentlemen, in their reasoning, have placed the interests of the several States 
and those of the United States in contrast ; this is not a fair view of the subject ; 
they must necessarily be involved in each other. What we apprehend is, that 
some sinister prejudice, or some prevailing passion, may assume the form of 
a genuine interest. The influence of these is as powerful as the most permanent 
conviction of the public good ; and against this influence we ought to provide. 
The local interests of a State ought in every case to give way to the interests 
of the Union ; for when a sacrifice of one or the other is necessary, the former 
becomes only an apparent, partial interest, and should yield, on the principle 
that the small good ought never to oppose the great one. When you assemble 
from your several counties in the Legislature, were every member to be guided 
only by the apparent interests of his county, government would be impracticable. 
There must be a perpetual accommodation and sacrifice of local advantages to 
general expediency; but the spirit of a mere popular assembly would rarely 
be actuated by this important principle. It is, therefore, absolutely necessary 
that the Senate should be so formed, as to be unbiased by false conceptions of 
the real interests, or undue attachment to the apparent good, of their several 
States. 

Gentlemen indulge too many unreasonable apprehensions of danger to the 
State Governments; they seem to suppose that the moment you put men into 
a national council, they become corrupt and tyrannical, and lose all their affection 



THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. 33 

for their fellow citizens. But can we imagine that the Senators will ever be so 
insensible of their own advantage, as to sacrifice the genuine interest of their 
constituents? The State Governments are essentially necessary to the form 
and spirit of the general system. As long, therefore, as Congress has a full 
conviction of this necessity, they must, even upon principles purely national, 
have as firm an attachment to the one as to the other. This conviction can 
never leave them, unless they become madmen. While the Constitution con- 
tinues to be read, and its prmciple known, the States must, by every rational 
man, be considered as essential, component parts of the Union ; and, therefore, 
the idea of sacrificing the former to the latter is wholly inadmissible. 

The objectors do not advert to the natural strength and resources of 
State Governments, which will ever give them an important superiority over 
the General Government. If we compare the nature of their different powers, 
or the means of popular influence which each possesses, we shall find the 
advantage entirely on the side of the States. This consideration, important 
as it is, seems to have been little attended to. The aggregate number of Rep- 
resentatives throughout the States may be two thousand. Their personal 
influence will, therefore, be proportionably more extensive than that of one 
or two hrmdred men in Congress. The State establishments of civil and mili- 
tary oiBcers of every description, infinitely surpassing in number any possible 
correspondent establishments in the General Government, will create such an 
extent and complication of attachments, as will ever secure the predilection and 
support of the people. Whenever, therefore, Congress shall meditate any 
infringement of the State constitutions, the great body of the people will natur- 
ally take part with their domestic Representatives. Can the General Govern- 
ment withstand such an united opposition? Will the people sufifer themselves 
to be stripped of their privileges? Will they sufifer their Legislatures to be 
reduced to a shadow and a name? The idea is shocking to common sense. 

From the circumstances already explained, and many others which might 
be mentioned, result a complicated, irresistible check, which must ever support 
the existence and importance of the State Governments. The danger, if any 
exists, flows from an opposite source. The probable evil is, that the General 
Government will be too dependent on the State Legislatures, too much governed 
by their prejudices, and too obsequious to their humors ; that the States, with 
every power in their hands, will make encroachments on the national authority, 
till the Union is weakened and dissolved. 

Every member must have been struck with an observation of a gentle- 
man from Albany. Do what you will, says he, local prejudices and opinions 
will go into the Government. What ! shall we then form a Constitution to 



34 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

cherish and strengthen these prejudices? Shall we confirm the distemper, 
instead of remedying it? It is undeniable that there must be a control some- 
where. Either the general interest is to control the particular interests, or 
the contrary. If the former, then certainly the Government ought to be so 
framed as to render the power of control efficient to all intents and purposes; 
if the latter, a striking absurdity follows : the controlling powers must be as 
numerous as the varying interests, and the operations of the Government must, 
therefore, cease; for, the moment you accommodate these different interests — 
which is the only way to set the Government in motion — you establish a con- 
trolling power. Thus, whatever constitutional provisions are made to the con- 
trary, every Government will be at last driven to the necessity of subjecting 
the partial to the universal interest. The gentlemen ought always, in their 
reasoning, to distinguish between the real, genuine good of a State, and the 
opinions and prejudices which may prevail respecting it ; the latter may be 
opposed to the general good, and consequently ought to be sacrificed ; the 
former is so involved in it, that it never can be sacrificed. 

There are certain social principles in human nature from which we may 
draw the most solid conclusions with respect to the conduct of individuals and 
of communities. We love our families more than our neighbors ; we love our 
neighbors more than our countrymen in general. The human affections, like 
the solar heat, lose their intensity as they depart from the center, and become 
languid in proportion to the expansion of the circle on which they act. On 
these principles, the attachment of the individual will be first and forever 
secured by the State Governments ; they will be a mutual protection and support. 
Another source of influence, which has already been pointed out, is the various 
official connections in the States. Gentlemen endeavor to evade the force of 
this by saying that these offices will be insignificant. This is by no means 
true. The State officers will ever be important, because they are necessary and 
useful. Their powers are such as are extremely interesting to the people ; such 
as affect their property, their liberty, and life. What is more important than 
the administration of justice and the execution of the civil and criminal laws? 
Can the State Governments become insignificant while they have the power of 
raising money, independently and without control? If they are really useful: 
if they are calculated to promote the essential interests of the people, they 
must have their confidence and support. The States can never lose their powers, 
till the whole people of America are robbed of their liberties. These must go 
together; they must support each other or meet one common fate. * * * 

With regard to the jurisdiction of the two Governments, I shall certainly 
admit that the Constitution ought to be so formed as not to prevent the States 



THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. 



35 



from providing for their own existence ; and I maintain that it is so formed ; and 
that their power of providing for themselves is sufficiently established. This is 
conceded by one gentleman, and in the next breath the concession is retracted. 
He says Congress has but one exclusive right in taxation — that of duties on 
imports ; certainly, then, their other powers are only concurrent. * * * The 
laws of the United States are supreme as to all their proper, constitutional 
objects; the laws of the States are supreme in the same way. These supreme 
laws may act on different objects without clashing; or they may operate on 
different parts of the same common object with perfect harmony. Suppose 
both Governments should lay a tax of a penny on a certain article ; has not 
each an independent and uncontrollable power to collect its own tax? The 
meaning of the maxim, there cannot be two supremes, is simply this: two 
powers cannot be supreme over each other. This meaning is entirely per- 
verted by the gentlemen. But, it is said, disputes between collectors are to be 
referred to the Federal courts. This is again wandering in the field of con- 
jecture. But suppose the fact is certain, is it not to be presumed that they 
will express the true meaning of the Constitution and the laws? Will they 
not be bound to consider the concurrent jurisdiction ; to declare that both the 
taxes shall have equal operation ; that both the powers, in that respect, are 
sovereign and co-extensive ? If they transgress their duty, we are to hope that 
they will be punished. Sir, we can reason from probabilities alone. When we 
leave common sense and give ourselves up to conjecture, there can be no cer- 
tainty, no security in our reasonings. * * * 

(Delivered in the Convention of Nev/ York, June 24, 1788.) 





36 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The British Treaty. 

By FISHER AMES, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1758, died 1808.) 



HE treaty is bad, fatally bad, is the cry. It sacrifices the interest, the 
honor, the independence of the United States, and the faith of our 
engagements to France. If we Hsten to the clamor of party intem- 
perance, the evils are of a number not to be counted, and of a nature 
not to be borne, even in idea. The language of passion and exag- 
geration may silence that of sober reason in other places ; it has not 
done it here. The question here is, whether the treaty be really so very fatal 
as to oblige the nation to break its faith. I admit that such a treaty ought not 
to be executed. I admit that self-preservation is the first law of society, as well 
as of individuals. It would, perhaps, be deemed an abuse of terms to call that 
a treaty which violates such a principle. I waive, also, for the present, any 
inquiry, what departments shall represent the nation, and annul the stipulations 
of a treaty. I content myself with pursuing the inquiry, whether the nature of 
this compact be such as to justify our refusal to carry it into effect. A treaty 
is the promise of a nation. Now, promises do not always bind him that makes 
them. But I lay down two rules, which ought to guide us in this case. The 
treaty must appear to be bad, not merely in the petty details, but in its char- 
acter, principle, and mass. And in the next place, this ought to be ascertained 
by the decided and general concurrence of the enlightened public. 

I confess there seems to be something very like ridicule thrown over the 
debate by the discussion of the articles in detail. The undecided point is, shall 
we break our faith ? And while our country and enlightened Europe await the 
issue with more than curiosity, we are employed to gather piecemeal, and article 
by article, from the instrument, a justification for the deed by trivial calculations 
of commercial profit and loss. This is little worthy of the subject, of this body, 
or of the nation. If the treaty is bad, it will appear to be so in its mass. Evil 
to a fatal extreme, if that be its tendency, requires no proof; it brings it. Ex- 




Fisher Ames. 



38 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

tremes speak for themselves and make their own law. What if the direct voyage 
of American ships to Jamaica, with horses or lumber, might net one or two 
per centum more than the present trade to Surinam ; would the proof of the fact 

avail anything in so grave a question as the violation of the public engagements ? 

* * * 

Why do they complain, that the West Indies are not laid open? Why do 
they lament, that any restriction is stipulated on the commerce of the East 
Indies? Why do they pretend, that if they reject this, and insist upon more, 
more will be accomplished ? Let us be explicit — more would not satisfy. If 
all was granted, would not a treaty of amity with Great Britain still be obnoxious ? 
Have we not this instant heard it urged against our envoy, that he was not 
ardent enough in his hatred of Great Britain? A treaty of amity is condemned 
because it was not made by a foe, and in the spirit of one. The same gentle- 
man, at the same instant, repeats a very prevailing objection, that no treaty 
should be made with the enemy of France. No treaty, exclaim others, should 
be made with a monarch or a despot ; there will be no naval security while those 
sea-robbers domineer on the ocean ; their den must be destroyed ; that nation 
must be extirpated. 

I like this, sir, because it is sincerity. With feelings such as these, we do 
not pant for treaties. Such passions seek nothing, and will be content with 
nothing, but the destruction of their object. If a treaty left King George his 
island, it would not answer; not if he stipulated to pay rent for it. It has been 
said, the world ought to rejoice if Britain was sunk in the sea; if where there 
are now men and wealth and laws and liberty, there was no more than a sand 
bank for sea monsters to fatten on ; a space for the storms of the ocean to mingle 
in conflict. * * * 

What is patriotism? Is it a narrow affection for the spot where a man was 
born ? Are the very clods where we tread entitled to this ardent preference be- 
cause they are greener? No, sir, this is not the character of the virtue, and it 
soars higher for its object. It is an extended self-love, mingling with all the 
enjoyments of life, and twisting itself with the minutest filaments of the heart. 
It is thus we obey the laws of society, because they are the laws of virtue. In 
their authority we see, not the array of force and terror, but the venerable image 
of our country's honor. Every good citizen makes that honor his own, and 
cherishes it not only as precious, but as sacred. He is willing to risk his life 
in its defense, and is conscious that he gains protection while he gives it. For, 
what rights of a citizen will be deemed inviolable when a State renounces the 
principles that constitute their security? Or if his life should not be invaded, 
what would its enjoyments be in a country odious in the eyes of strangers and 



THE BRITISH TREATY. 39 

dishonored in his own? Could he look with affection and veneration to such 
a country as his parent? The sense of having one would die within him; he 
would blush for his patriotism, if he retained any, and justly, for it would be a 
vice. He would be a banished man in his native land. I see no exception to 
the respect that is paid among nations to the law of good faith. If there are 
cases in this enlightened period when it is violated, there are none when it is 
decried. It is the philosophy of politics, the religion of governments. It is 
observed by barbarians — a whiff of tobacco smoke, or a string of beads, gives 
not merely binding force but sanctity to treaties. Even in Algiers, a truce may 
be bought for money, but when ratified, even Algiers is too wise, or too just, 
to disown and annul its obligation. Thus we see, neither the ignorance of 
savages, nor the principles of an association for piracy and rapine, permit a nation 
to despise its engagements. If, sir, there could be a resurrection from the foot 
of the gallows, if the victims of justice could live again, collect together and 
form a society, they would, however loath, soon find themselves obliged to make 
justice, that justice under which they fell, the fundamental law of their State. 
They would perceive, it was their interest to make others respect, and they 
would, therefore, soon pay some respect themselves, to the obligations of good 
faith. 

It is painful, I hope it is superfluous, to make even the supposition, that 
America should furnish the occasion of this opprobrium. No, let me not even 
imagine, that a Republican government, sprung, as our own is, from a people 
enlightened and uncorrupted, a government whose origin is right, and whose 
daily discipline is duty, can, upon solemn debate, make its option to be faith- 
less — can dare to act what despots dare not avow, what our own example 
evinces, the States of Barbary are unsuspected of. No, let me rather make the 
supposition, that Great Britain refuses to execute the treaty, after we have done 
everything to carry it into effect. Is there any language of reproach pungent 
enough to express your commentary on the fact? What would you say, or 
rather what would you not say? Would you not tell them, wherever an English- 
man might travel, shame would stick to him — he would disown his country. 
You would exclaim, England, proud of your wealth, and arrogant in the pos- 
session of power — blush for these distinctions, which become the vehicles of 
your dishonor. Such a nation might truly say to corruption, thou art my father, 
and to the worm, thou art my mother and my sister. We should say of such a 
race of men, their name is a heavier burden than their debt. * * * 

(Delivered in the House of Representatives, April 28, 1796.) 




40 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Inaugural Address. 

By THOMAS JEFFERSON, of Virginia, 

(Born 1743, died 1826.) 

p^RIENDS AND FELLOW CITIZENS: Called upon to undertake 
the duties of the first executive office of our country, I avail myself 
of the presence of that portion of my fellow citizens which is here 
assembled, to express my grateful thanks for the favor with which 
they have been pleased to look toward me, to declare a sincere con- 
sciousness, that the task is above my talents, and that I approach it 
with those anxious and awful presentiments, w^hich the greatness of the charge, 
and the weakness of my powers, so justly inspire. A rising nation, spread over 
a wide and fruitful land, traversing all the seas with the rich productions of their 
industry, engaged in commerce with nations who feel power and forget right, 
advancing rapidly to destinies beyond the reach of mortal eye ; wdien I contem- 
plate these transcendent objects, and see the honor, the happiness, and the 
hopes of this beloved country committed to the issue and the auspices of this 
day, I shrink from the contemplation, and humble myself before the magnitude 
of the undertaking. Utterly, indeed, should I despair, did not the presence of 
many, wdiom I see here, remind me, that, in the other high authorities provided 
by our Constitution, I shall find resources of wisdom, of virtue, and of zeal, on 
which to rely under all difficulties. To you, then, gentlemen, who are charged 
with the sovereign functions of legislation, and to those associated with you,- I 
look wdth encouragement for that guidance and support which may enable us to 
steer wath safety the vessel in wdiich we are all embarked, amidst the conflicting 
elements of a troubled world. 

During the contest of opinion through wdiich we have passed, the animation 
of discussions and of exertions has sometimes worn an aspect which might im- 
]jose on strangers unused to think freely, and to speak and to write what they 
think ; but this being now decided by the voice of the nation, announced accord- 
ing to the rules of the Constitution, all \vi\\ of course arrange themselves under 
the wall of the law, and unite in common efforts for the common good. All, too, 
will bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in 
all cases to prevail, that will, to be rightful, must be reasonable; that the minor- 
ity possess their equal rights, which ecjual laws must protect, and to violate 




Thomas Jefferson. 



42 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

which would be oppression. Let us then, fellow citizens, unite with one heart 
and one mind, let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection 
without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things. And let us 
reflect, that having banished from our land that religious intolerance under 
which mankind so long bled and suffered, we have yet gained little, if we 
countenance a political intolerance, as despotic, as wicked, and as capable of as 
bitter and bloody persecutions. During the throes and convulsions of the 
ancient world, during the agonizing spasms of infuriated man, seeking through 
blood and slaughter his long-lost liberty, it was not wonderful that the agitation 
of the billows should reach even this distant and peaceful shore ; that this should 
be more felt and feared by some, and less by others, and should divide opinions 
as to measures of safety ; but every difference of opinion is not a difference of 
principle. We have called by different names brethren of the same principle. 
We are all Republicans ; we are all Federalists. If there be any among us who 
wish to dissolve this Union, or to change its republican form, let them stand 
undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be 
tolerated, where reason is left free to combat it. I know, indeed, that some 
honest men fear that a republican government cannot be strong ; that this Gov- 
ernment is not strong enough. But would the honest patriot, in the full tide 
of successful experiment, abandon a government which has so far kept us free 
and firm, on the theoretic and visionary fear, that this Government, the world's 
best hope, may, by possibility, want energy to preserve itself? I trust not. I 
believe this, on the contrary, the strongest government on earth. I believe it 
the only one where every man, at the call of the law, would fly to the standard 
of the law, and would meet invasions of the public order as his own personal 
concern. Sometimes it is said, that man cannot be trusted with the govern- 
ment of himself. Can he then be trusted with the government of others? Or, 
have we found angels in the form of kings, to govern him? Let history an- 
swer this question. 

Let us then, with courage and confidence, pursue our own federal and re- 
publican principles ; our attachment to union and representative government. 
Kindly separated by nature and a wide ocean from the exterminating havoc of 
one quarter of the globe ; too high-minded to endure the degradation of the 
others, possessing a chosen country, with room enough for our descendants to 
the thousandth and thousandth generation, entertaining a due sense of our 
equal right to the use of our own faculties, to the acquisition of our own indus- 
try, to honor and confidence from our fellow citizens, resulting not from birth, 
but from our actions and their sense of them, enlightened by a benign religion, 
professed indeed and practiced in various forms, yet ah of them inculcating 
honesty, truth, temperance, gratitude, and the love of man. acknowledging and 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 43 

adoring an overruling Providence, which, by all its dispensations, proves that it 
delights in the happiness of man here, and his greater happiness hereafter ; with 
all these blessings, what more is necessary to make us a happy and prosperous 
people? Still one thing more, fellow citizens, a wise and frugal government, 
which shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise 
free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not 
take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good 
government ; and this is necessary to close the circle of our felicities. 

About to enter, fellow citizens, upon the exercise of duties which compre- 
hend everything dear and valuable to you, it is proper you should understand 
what I deem the essential principles of our Government, and, consequently, 
those which ought to shape its administration. I will compress them within the 
narrowest compass they will bear, stating the general principle, but not all its 
limitations. Equal and exact justice to all men, of whatever state or persuasion, 
religious or political ; peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, 
entangling alliances with none ; the support of the State Governments in all their 
rights, as the most competent administrations for our domestic concerns, and the 
surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies ; the preservation of the Gen- 
eral Government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet-anchor of our 
peace at home and safety abroad; a jealous care of the right of election by the 
people, a mild and safe corrective of abuses which are lopped by the sword of 
revolution where peaceable remedies are unprovided ; absolute acquiescence in 
the decisions of the majority, the vital principle of republics, from which there 
is no appeal but to force, the vital principle and immediate parent of despotism ; 
a well-disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace, and for the first moments of 
war, till regulars may relieve them ; the supremacy of the civil over the military 
authority ; economy in the public expense, that labor may be lightly burdened ; 
the honest payment of our debts, and sacred preservation of the public faith ; 
encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid ; the diffusion 
of information, and arraignment of all abuses at the bar of the public reason ; 
freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and freedom of person, under the pro- 
tection of the habeas corpus, and trial by juries impartially selected. These prin- 
ciples form the bright constellation, which has gone before us, and guided our 
steps through an age of revolution and reformation. The wisdom of our sages, 
and blood of our heroes, have been devoted to their attainment; they should 
be the creed of our political faith, the text of civic instruction, the touchstone by 
which to try the services of those we trust ; and should we wander from them 
in moments of error or of alarm, let us hasten to retrace our steps, and to regain 
the road which alone leads to peace, liberty, and safety. * * * 

(Delivered at Washington, March 4, 1801.) 




44 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Militia Bill. 

By JOHN RANDOLPH, of Virginia. 

(Born 1773, died 1833.) 



R. SPEAKER : This is a question, as it has been presented to this 
House, of peace or war. In that Hght it has been argued ; in no other 
Hght can I consider it, after the declarations made by members of 
the Committee of Foreign Relations. * * ''' 

1 cannot refrain from smiling at the liberality of the gentleman 
in giving Canada to New York in order to strengthen the northern 
balance of power ; while, at the same time, he forewarns her that the western scale 
must preponderate. I can almost fancy that I see the Capitol in motion toward 
tlie falls of Ohio ; after a short sojourn, taking its flight to the Mississippi, and 
finally alighting at Darien ; which, when the gentleman's dreams are realized, 
will be a most eligible seat of government for the new republic (or empire) of 
the two Americas! But it seems that in 1808 we talked and acted foolishly, and 
to give some color of consistency to that folly we must now commit a greater. 

I hope we shall act a wise part ; take warning by our follies since we have 
become sensible of them, and resolve to talk and act foolishly no more. It is, 
indeed, high time to give over such preposterous language and oroceedings. 
This war of conquest, a war for the acquisition of territory and subjects, is to 
be a new commentary on the doctrine that republicans are destitute of ambi- 
tion ; that they are addicted to peace, wedded to the happiness and safety of the 
great body of their people. But it seems this is to be a holiday campaign ; there 
is to be no expense of blood, or of treasure on our part ; Canada is to conquer 
herself ; she is to be subdued by the principles of fraternity ! The people of that 
country are first to be seduced from their allegiance and converted into traitors, 
as preparatory to making them good citizens ! Although I must acknowledge 
that some of our flaming patriots were thus manufactured, I do not think the 
process would hold good with a whole community. It is a dangerous experi- 
ment. We are to succeed in the French mode, by the system of fraternization — 
all is French. But how dreadfully it might be retorted on the Southern and 
Western slave-holding States. I detest this subornation of treason. No; if we 




John Randolph. 



46 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

must have them, let them fall by the valor of our arms ; by fair, legitimate con- 
quest; not become the victims of treacherous seduction. 

I am not surprised at the war spirit which is manifesting itself in gentlemen 
from the South. In the years 1805-1806, in a struggle for the carrying trade of 
belligerent colonial produce, this country was most unwisely brought into col- 
lision with the great powers of Europe. By a series of most impolitic and 
ruinous measures, utterly incomprehensible to every rational, sober-minded 
man, the Southern planters, by their own votes, have succeeded in knocking 
down the price of cotton to seven cents, and of tobacco (a few choice crops 
excepted) to nothing ; and in raising the price of blankets (of which a few would 
not be amiss in a Canadian campaign), coarse woollens, and every article of first 
necessity, three or four hundred per centum. And now, that by our own acts, 
we have brought ourselves into this unprecedented condition, we must get out 
of it in any way, but by an acknowledgment of our own want of wisdom and 
forecast. But is war the true remedy? Who will profit by it? Speculators; a 
few lucky merchants, who draw prizes in the lottery ; commissaries and con- 
tractors. Who must suffer by it ? The people. It is their blood, their taxes that 
must flow to support it. * * * 

I am gratified to find gentlemen acknowledging the demoralizing and de- 
structive consequences of the non-importation law ; confessing the truth of all 
that its opponents foretold, when it was enacted. And will you plunge yourselves 
in war, because you have passed a foolish and ruinous law, and are ashamed to 
repeal it ? " But our good friend, the French Emperor, stands in the way of its 
repeal, and we cannot go too far in making sacrifices to him, who has given 
such demonstration of his love for the Americans ; we must, in point of fact, 
become parties to his war. Who can be so cruel as to refuse him that favor? " 
My imagination shrinks from the miseries of such a connection. I call upon 
the House to reflect, whether they are not about to abandon all reclamation for 
the unparalleled outrages, "insults, and injuries" of the French Government; 
to give up our claim for plundered millions ; and I ask what reparation or atone- 
ment they can expect to obtain in hours of future dalliance, after they shall 
have made a tender of their person to this great deflowerer of the virginity of 
Republics. We have, by our own wise (I will not say wiseacre) measures, so 
increased the trade and wealth of Montreal and Quebec, that at last we begin 
to cast a wistful eye at Canada. Having done so much toward its improvement, 
by the exercise of " our restrictive energies," we begin to think the laborer 
worthy of his hire, and to put in a claim for our portion. Suppose it ours, are 
we any nearer to our point? As his Minister said to the King of Epirus, " May 
we not as well take our bottle of wine before as after this exploit? " Go ! march 



THE MILITIA BILL. 47 

to Canada ! leave the broad bosom of the Chesapeake and her hundred tributary 
rivers ; the whole line of sea coast from Machias to St. Mary's, unprotected ! 
You have taken Quebec — have you conquered England ? Will you seek for 
the deep foundations of her power in the frozen deserts of Labrador? 

Will you call upon her to leave your ports and harbors untouched only 
just till you can return from Canada, to defend them? The coast is to be left 
defenseless, while men of the interior are reveling in conquest and spoil. * * * 

No sooner was the report laid on the table, than the vultures were flocking 
around their prey — the carcass of a great military establishment. Men of 
tainted reputation, of broken fortune (if they ever had any), and of battered 
constitutions, " choice spirits tired of the dull pursuits of civil life," were seeking 
after agencies and commissions, willing to doze in gross stupidity over the 
public fire; to light the public candle at both ends. Honorable men un- 
doubtedly there are ready to serve their country; but what man of spirit, or of 
self-respect, will accept a commission in the present army? The gentleman 
from Tennessee (Mr. Grundy) addressed himself yesterday exclusively to the 
" Republicans of the House." I know not whether I may consider myself as 
entitled to any part of the benefit of the honorable gentleman's discourse. It 
belongs not, however, to that gentleman to decide. If we must have an ex- 
position of the doctrines of republicanism, I shall receive it from the fathers of 
the church, and not from the junior apprentices of the law. * * * 

Make it out that Great Britain has instigated the Indians on a late occasion, 
and I am ready for battle, but not for dominion. I am unwilling, however, un- 
der present circumstances, to take Canada, at the risk of the Constitution, to 
embark in a common cause with France, and be dragged at the wheels of the 
car of some Burr or Bonaparte. For a gentleman from Tennessee, or Genesee, 
or Lake Champlain, there may be some prospect of advantage. Their hemp 
would bear a great price by the exclusion of foreign supply. In that, too, the 
great importers are deeply interested. The upper country of the Hudson and 
the lakes would be enriched by the supplies for the troops, which they alone 
could furnish. They would have the exclusive market; to say nothing of the 
increased preponderance from the acquisition of Canada and that section of the 
Union, which the Southern and Western States have already felt so severely in 
the apportionment bill. * * * 

The great autocrat of all the Russias receives the homage of our high 
consideration. The Dey of Algiers and his divan of pirates are very civil, good 
sort of people, with whom we find no difficulty in maintaining the relations of 
peace and amity. " Turks, Jews, and infidels ; " Melimelli or the Little Turtle ; 
barbarians and savages of every clime and color, are welcome to our arms. With 



48 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

chiefs of banditti, negro or mulatto, we can treat and trade. Name, however, 
but England, and all our antipathies are up in arms against her. Against whom ? 
Against those whose blood runs in our veins ; in common with whom, we claim 
Shakespeare, and Newton, and Chatham, for our countrymen; whose form of 
government is the freest on earth, our own only excepted; from whom every 
valuable principle of our own institutions has been borrowed — representation, 
jury trial, voting the supplies, writ of habeas corpus, our whole civil and crim- 
inal jurisprudence ; — against our fellow Protestants, identified in blood, in 
language, in religion, with ourselves. In what school did the worthies of our 
land, the Washingtons, Henrys, Hancocks, Franklins, Rutledges of America 
learn those principles of civil libert}'^ which were so nobly asserted by their wis- 
dom and valor? American resistance to British usurpation has not been more 
warmly cherished by these great men and their compatriots ; not more by 
Washington, Hancock, and Henry, than by Chatham and his illustrious asso- 
ciates in the British Parliament. It ought to be remembered, too, that the heart 
of the English people was with us. It was a selfish and corrupt Ministry, and 
their servile tools, to whom we were not more opposed than they were. I trust 
that none such may ever exist among us ; for tools will never be wanting to 
subserve the purposes, however ruinous or wicked, of kings and ministers of 
state. I acknowledge the influence of a Shakespeare and a Milton upon my 
imagination, of a Locke upon my understanding, of a Sidney upon my political 
principles, of a Chatham upon qualities which, would to God, I possessed in 
common with that illustrious man ! of a Tillotson, a Sherlock, and a Porteus 

v;pon my religion. This is a British influence which I can never shake 
off * * * 

(Delivered in the House of Re]>resentatives, December lo, 1811.) 





THE WAR OF 1812. 49 



The War of 1812. 

By HENRY CLAY, of Kentucky. 

(Born 1777. died 1852.) 

IR, gentlemen appear to me to forget that they stand on American soil; 
that they are not in the British House of Commons, but in the chamber 
of the House of Representatives of the United States ; that we have 
nothing to do with the aiTairs of Europe, the partition of territory and 
sovereignty there, except so far as these things affect the interests of 
our own country. Gentlemen transform themselves into the Burkes, 
Chathams, and Pitts of another country,, and, forgetting, from honest zeal, the 
interests of America, engage with European sensibility in the discussion of 
European interests. If gentlemen ask me whether I do not view with regret 
and horror the concentration of such vast power in the hands of Bonaparte, I 
reply that I do. I regret to see the Emperor of China holding such immense 
sway over the fortunes of millions of our species. I regret to see Great Britain 
possessing so uncontrolled a command over all the waters of the globe. If I 
had the ability to distribute among the nations of Europe their several portions 
of power and of sovereignty, I would say that Holland should be resuscitated 
and given the weight she enjoyed in the days of her DeWitts. I would confine 
France within her natural boundaries, the Alps, Pyrenees, and the Rhine, and 
make her a secondary naval power only. I would abridge the British maritime 
power, raise Prussia and Austria to their original condition, and preserve the 
integrity of the Empire of Russia. But these are speculations. I look at the 
political transactions of Europe, with the single exception of their possible bear- 
ing upon us, as I do at the history of other countries and other times. I do 
not survey them with half the interest that I do the movements in South America. 
Out political relation with them is much less important than it is supposed to be. 
I have no fears of French or English subjugation. If we are united, we are too 
powerful for the mightiest nation in Europe or all Europe combined. If we 
are separated and torn asunder, we shall become an easy prey to the weakest of 
them. In the latter dreadful contingency our country will not be worth pre- 
serving. 



50 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Next to the notice which the opposition has found itself called upon to 
.bestow upon the French Emperor, a distinguished citizen of Virginia, formerly 
President of the United States, has never for a moment failed to receive their 
kindest and most respectful attention. An honorable gentleman from Massa- 
chusetts (Mr. Quincy), of whom, I am sorry to say, it becomes necessary for 
me, in the course of my remarks, to take some notice, has alluded to him in a 
remarkable manner. Neither his retirement from public office, his eminent ser- 
vices, nor his advanced age, can exempt this patriot from the coarse assaults of 
party malevolence. No, sir. In 1801 he snatched from the rude hand of 
usurpation the violated Constitution of his country, and that is his crime. He 
preserved that instrument, in form, and substance, and spirit, a precious inherit- 
ance for generations to come, and for this he can never be forgiven. How vain 
and impotent is party rage, directed against such a man. He is not more ele- 
A-ated by his lofty residence, upon the summit of his own favorite mountain, 
than he is lifted, by the serenity of his mind, and the consciousness of a well- 
spent life, above the malignant passions and bitter feelings of the day. No ! 
his own beloved Monticello is not less moved by the storms that beat against 
its sides than is this illustrious man by the bowlings of the whole British pack, 
set loose from the Essex kennel. When the gentleman to whom I have been 
compelled to allude shall have mingled his dust with that of his abused ancestors, 
when he shall have been consigned to oblivion, or, if he lives at all, shall live 
only in the treasonable annals of a certain junto, the name of Jefferson will be 
hailed with gratitude, his memory honored and cherished as the second founder 
of the liberties of the people, and the period of his administration will be looked 
hack to as one of the happiest and brightest epochs of American history ; an 
oasis in the midst of a sandy desert. But I beg the gentleman's pardon ; he has 
already secured to himself a more imperishable fame than I had supposed ; I 
think it was about four years ago that he submitted to the House of Representa- 
tives an initiative proposition for the impeachment of Mr. Jefferson. The House 
condescended to consider it. The gentleman debated it with his usual temper, 
moderation, and urbanity. The House decided upon it in the most solemn 
manner, and, although the gentleman had somehow obtained a second, the final 

vote stood one for, and one hundred and seventeen against, the proposition, 
w- * * 

But, sir, I must speak of another subject, which I never think of but with 
feelings of the deepest awe. The gentleman from Massachusetts, in imitation 
of some of his predecessors of 1799, has entertained us with a picture of Cabinet 
plots, presidential plots, and all sorts of plots, which have been engendered by 
the diseased state of the gentleman's imagination. I wish, sir, that another 




Henry Clay. 



52 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

plot, of a much more serious and alarming character — a plot that aims at the 
dismemberment of our Union — had only the same imaginary existence. But 
no man, who has paid any attention to the tone of certain prints and to trans- 
actions in a particular quarter of the Union, for several years past, can doubt 
the existence of such a plot. It was far, ver} far from my intention to charge 
the opposition with such a design. No; I believe them generally incapable 
of it. But I cannot say as much for some who have been unworthily associated 
with them in the quarter of the Union to which I have referred. The gentle^ 
rnan cannot have forgotten his own sentiment, uttered even on the floor of this 
liouse, " peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must," nearly at the very time 
Henry's mission was undertaken. The flagitiousness of that eml^assy had been 
attempted to be concealed by directing the public attention to the price which, 
the gentleman says, was given for the disclosure. As if any price could change 
ihe atrociousness of the attempt on the part of (jreat Britain, or could extenuate, 
in the slightest degree, the ofTense of those citizens, who entertained and deliber- 
ated on a proposition so infamous and unnatural. * * * But, sir. I will quit 
this unpleasant subject. * * * 

The war was declared because Great Britain arrogated to herself the pre- 
tension of regulating our foreign trade, under the delusive name of retaliatory 
orders in council — a pretension by which she undertook to proclaim to Ameri- 
can enterprise, " thus far shalt thou go, and no further " — orders which she 
refused to revoke after the alleged cause of their enactment had ceased ; because 
she persisted in the practice of impressing American seamen ; because she had 
instigated the Indians to commit hostilities against us ; and because she refused 
indemnity for her past injuries upon our commerce. I throw out of the question 
other wrongs. So undeniable were the causes of the war, so powerfully did 
they address themselves to the feelings of the whole American people, that when 
the bill was pending before this House, gentlemen in the O]:)position. although 
provoked to debate, would not, or could not, utter one syllable against it. It 
is true, they wrapped themselves up in sullen silence, pretending they did not 
ciioose to debate such a question in secret session. Wliile speaking of the pro- 
ceedings on that occasion, I beg to be permitted to advert to another fact which 
transpired — an important fact, material for the nation to know, and which I 
have often regretted had not been spread upon our journals. My honorable 
colleague (Mr. McKee) moved, in committee of the whole, to comprehend 
France in the war ; and when the question was taken upon the proposition, there 
appeared but ten votes in support of it. of whom seven belonged to this side of 
llie House, and three only to the other. ''•" * * 

It is not to the British principle (of allegiance), objectionable as it is, that 



I 

i 



THE WAR OF 1812. 53 

we are alone to look ; it is to her practice, no matter what guise she puts on. 
It is in vain to assert the inviolability of the obligation of allegiance. It is in 
vain to set up the plea of necessity, and to allege that she cannot exist without 
the impressment of her seamen. The naked truth is, she comes, by her press- 
gangs, on board of our vessels, seizes our native as well as naturalized seam.en, 
and drags them into her service. It is the case, then, of the assertion of an 
erroneous principle, and of a practice not conformable to the asserted principle 
— a principle which, if it were theoretically right, must be forever practically 
wrong — a practice which can obtain countenance from no principle whatever, 
and to submit to which, on our part, would betray the most abject degradation. 
We are told, by gentlemen in the opposition, that Government has not done all 
that was incumbent on it to do, to avoid just cause of complaint on the part of 
Great Britain ; that in particular the certificates of protection, authorized by the 
act of 1796, are fraudulently used. Sir, Government has done too much in 
granting those paper protections. I can never think of them without being- 
shocked. They resemble the passes which the master grants to his negro slave : 
" Let the bearer, Mungo, pass and repass without molestation." What do they 
imply? That Great Britain has a right to seize all who are not provided with 
them. From their very nature, they must be liable to abuse on both sides. 
If Great Britain desires a mark by which she can know her own subjects, let her 
give them an earmark. The colors that float from the masthead should be the 
credentials of our seamen. There is no safety to us, and the gentlemen have 
shown it, but in the rule that all who sail under the flag (not being enemies) 
are protected by the flag. It is impossible that this country should ever aban- 
don the gallant tars who have won for us such splendid trophies. Let me sup- 
pose that the genius of Columbia should visit one of them in his oppressor's 
prison, and attempt to reconcile him to his forlorn and wretched condition. 
She would say to him, in the language of gentlemen on the other side: " Great 
Britain intends you no harm ; she did not mean to impress you, but one of her 
own subjects ; having taken you by mistake, I will remonstrate, and try to pre- 
vail upon her, by peaceable means, to release you ; but I cannot, my son, fight 
for you." If he did not consider this mere mockery, the poor tar would address 
her judgment and say : " You owe me, my country, protection ; I owe you, 
in return, obedience. I am no British subject ; I am a native of old Massa- 
chusetts, where lived my aged father, my wife, my children. I have faithfully 
discharged my duty. Will you refuse to do yours ? " Appealing to her pas- 
sions, he would continue : " I lost this eye in fighting under Truxton, with the 
Jnsnrgcntc: I got this scar before Tripoli; I broke this leg on board the Con- 
stitution, when the Guerrierc struck." * * * J -wjll not imagine the dreadful 



54 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



catastrophe to which he would be driven by an abandonment of him to his 
oppressor. It will not be, it cannot be, that his country will refuse him pro- 
tection. * * =i= 

An honorable peace is attainable only by an efficient war. My plan would 
be to call out the ample resources of the country, give them a judicious direction, 
prosecute the war with the utmost vigor, strike wherever we can reach the 
enemy, at sea or on land, and negotiate the terms of a peace at Quebec or at 
Halifax. We are told that England is a proud and lofty nation, which, dis- 
daining to wait for danger, meets it half way. Haughty as she is we trivunphed 
over her once, and, if we do not listen to the counsels of timidity and despair, 
we shall again prevail. In such a cause, with the aid of Providence, we must 
come out crowned with success ; but. if we fail, let us fail like men, lash our- 
selves to our gallant tars, and expire together in one common struggle, fighting 

for FREE TRADE AND SEAMEn's RIGHTS. 

(Delivered in the House of Representatives, January 8, 1813.) 





FOOT'S RESOLUTION. 55 



Foot's Resolution. 

By ROBERT Y. HAYNE, of South Carolina. 

(Born 1791, died 1840.) 



R. SPEAKER: Sir, I question no man's opinions; I impeach no man's 
motives ; I charged no party, or State, or section of country with 
hostility to any other, but ventured, as I thought, in a becoming 
spirit, to put forth my own sentiments in relation to a great national 
question of public policy. Such was my course. The gentleman 
from Missouri (Mr. Benton), it is true, had charged upon the Eastern 
States an early and continued hostility toward the West, and referred to a num- 
ber of historical facts and documents in support of that charge. Now, sir, how 
have these dififerent arguments been met? The honorable gentleman from 
Massachusetts, after deliberating a whole night upon his course, comes into this 
chamber to vindicate New England ; and instead of making up his issue with the 
gentleman from Missouri, on the charges which he had preferred, chooses to 
consider me as the author of those charges, and losing sight entirely of that 
gentleman, selects me as his adversary, and pours out all the vials of his mighty 
wrath upon my devoted head. Nor is he willing to stop there. He goes on to 
assail the institutions and policy of the South, and calls in question the prin- 
ciples and conduct of the State which I have the honor to represent. When I 
find a gentleman of mature age and experience, of acknowledged talents and 
profound sagacity, pursuing a course like this, declining the contest offered from 
the West, and making war .upon the unoffending South, I must believe, I am 
bound to believe, he has some object in view which he has not ventured to 
disclose. Mr. President, why is this ? Has the gentleman discovered in former 
controversies with the gentleman from Missouri that he is overmatched by 
that Senator? And does he hope for an easy victory over a more feeble adver- 
sary? Has the gentleman's distempered fancy been disturbed by gloomy fore- 
bodings of " new alliances to be formed," at which he hinted? Has the ghost 
of the murdered coalition come back, like the ghost of Banquo, to " sear the 
eyeballs " of the gentleman, and will not down at his bidding? Are dark 
visions of broken hopes and honors lost forever still floating before his heated 



56 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

imagination? Sir, if it be his object to thrust me between the gentleman from 
Missouri and himself, in order to rescue the East from the contest it has pro- 
voked with the West, he shall not be gratified. Sir, I will not be dragged into 
the defense of my friend from Missouri. The South shall not be forced into a 
conflict not its own. The gentleman from Missouri is able to fight his own 
battles. The gallant West needs no aid from the South to repel any attack 
which may be made upon them from any quarter. Let the gentleman from 
Massachusetts controvert the facts and arguments of the gentleman from Mis- 
souri, if he can — and if he win the victory, let him wear the honors ; I shall not 
deprive him of his laurels. * * * 

Sir. anyone acquainted with the history of parties in this country will recog- 
nize in the points now in dispute between the Senator from Massachusetts and 
myself the very grounds Avhich have, from the beginning, divided the two great 
parties in this country, and which (call these parties by what names you will, 
and amalgamate them as you may) will divide them forever. The true dis- 
tinction between those parties is laid down in a celebrated manifesto issued by 
the convention of the Federalists of Massachusetts, assembled in Boston, in Feb- 
ruary, 1824, on the occasion of organizing a party opposition to the re-election 
of Governor Eustis. The gentleman will recognize this as " the canonical book 
of political scripture ; "" and it instructs us that, when the American colonies 
redeemed themselves from British bondage, and became so many independent 
nations, they proposed to form a Natioxai. L'xiox (not a Federal I'nion. sir. 
but a National Union). Those who were in favor of a union of the States in 
this form became known by the name of Federalists ; those who wanted no 
union of the States, or disliked the proposed form of union, became known by 
the name of Anti-Federalists. By means which need not be enumerated, the 
Anti-Federalists became (after the expiration of twelve years) our national 
rulers, and for a period of sixteen years, until the close of Mr. Madison's admin- 
istration in 1817, continued to exercise the exclusive direction of our public 
afifairs. Here, sir, is the true history of the origin, rise, and progress of the 
party of National Republicans, who date back to the very origin of the Covern- 
ment. and who then, as now, choose to consider the Constitution as having 
created not a Federal, but a National, union ; who regarded " consolidation " as 
no evil, and who doubtless consider it " a consummation to be wished "" to build 
up a great " central government." " one and indivisible." Sir, there have 
existed, in every age and every country, two distinct orders of men — the hwers 
of freedom and the devoted advoeates of pozcer. 

The same great leading principles, modified only l)y the peculiarities of 
manners, habits, and institutions, divided parties in the ancient republics, anj- 




Robert Y. Hayne. 



58 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

mated the Whigs and Tories of Great Britain, distinguished in our times the 
Liberals and Ultras of France, and may be traced even in the bloody struggles 
of unhappy Spain. Sir, when the gallant Riego, who devoted himself and all 
that he possessed to the liberties of his country, was dragged to the scafifold, 
followed by the tears and lamentations of every lover of freedom throughout 
the world, he perished amid the deafening cries of " Long live the absolute 
king ! " The people whom I represent, Mr. President, are the descendants of 
those who brought with them to this country, as the most precious of their pos- 
sessions, " an ardent love of liberty; " and while that shall be preserved, they 
will always be found manfully struggling against the consolidation of the Govern- 
ment AS THE WORST OF EVILS. * * * 

Who, then, Mr. President, are the true friends of the L^nion? Those who 
would confine the Federal Government strictly within the limits prescribed by 
the Constitution ; who would preserve to the States and the people all powers 
not expressly delegated ; who would make this a Federal and not a National 
Union, and who, administering the Government in a spirit of equal justice, 
would make it a blessing, and not a curse. And who are its enemies? Those 
who are in favor of consolidation ; who are constantly stealing power from the 
States, and adding strength to the Federal Government ; who, assuming an 
unwarrantable jurisdiction over the States and the people, undertake to regu- 
late the whole industry and capital of the country. But, sir, of all descriptions 
of men, I .consider those as the worst enemies of the Union, who sacrifice the 
equal rights which belong to every member of the confederacy to combinations 
of interested majorities for personal or political objects. But the gentleman 
apprehends no evil from the dependence of the States on the Federal Govern- 
ment ; he can see no danger of corruption from the influence of money or 
patronage. Sir, I know that it is supposed to be a wise saying that " patronage 
is a source of weakness ; " and in support of that maxim it has been said that 
" every ten appointments make a hundred enemies." But I am rather inclined 
to think, with the eloquent and sagacious orator now reposing on his laurels 
on the banks of the Roanoke, that " the power of conferring favors creates a 
crowd of dependents ; " he gave a forcible illustration of the truth of the remark, 
when he told us of the effect of holding up the savory morsel to the eager 
eyes of the hungry hounds gathered around his door. It mattered not whether 
the gift was bestowed on " Towzer " or " Sweetlips," " Tray," " Blanche," or 
' Sweetheart ; " while held in suspense, they were all governed by a nod, and 
when the morsel was bestowed, the expectation of the favors of to-morrow kept 
up the subjection of to-day. 

The Senator from Massachusetts, in denouncing what he is pleased to call 



FOOT'S RESOLUTION. 59 

the Carolina doctrine, has attempted to throw ridicule upon the idea that a 
State has any constitutional remedy by the exercise of its sovereign authority, 
against " a gross, palpable, and deliberate violation of the Constitution." He 
calls it " an idle " or " a ridiculous notion," or something to that effect, and 
added, that it would make the Union a " mere rope of sand." Now, sir, as 
the gentleman has not condescended to enter into any examination of the ques- 
tion, and has been satisfied with throwing the weight of his authority into the 
scale, I do not deem it necessary to do more than to throw into the opposite 
scale the authority on which South Carolina relies ; and there, for the present, 
I am perfectly willing to leave the controversy. The South Carolina doctrine, 
that is to say, the doctrine contained in an exposition reported by a committee 
of the Legislature in December, 1828, and published by their authority, is the 
good old Republican doctrine of '98 — the doctrine af the celebrated " Vir- 
ginia Resolutions " of that year, and of " Madison's Report " of '99. It will be 
recollected that the Legislature of Virginia, in December, '98, took into con- 
sideration the alien and sedition laws, then considered by all Republicans as a 
gross violation of the Constitution of the United States, and on that day passed, 
among others, the following resolution : 

" The General Assembly doth explicitly and peremptorily declare, that it 
views the powers of the Federal Government, as resulting from the compact to 
which the States are parties, as limited by the plain sense and intention of the 
instrument constituting that compact, as no further valid than they are author- 
ized by the grants enumerated in that compact ; and that in case of a deliberate, 
palpable, and dangerous exercise of other powers not granted by the said 
compact, the States who are the parties thereto have the right, and are in duty 
bound, to interpose for arresting the progress of the evil, and for maintaining 
within their respective limits the authorities, rights, and liberties appertaining 
to them." 

In addition to the above resolution, the General Assembly of Virginia 
" appealed to the other States, in the confidence that they would concur with 
that commonwealth, that the acts aforesaid (the alien and sedition laws) are 
unconstitutional, and that the necessary and proper measures would be taken 
by each for co-operating with Virginia in maintaining unimpaired the authorities, 
rights, and liberties reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." * * * 

But, sir, our authorities do not stop here. The State of Kentucky responded 
to Virginia, and on the loth of November, 1798, adopted those celebrated reso- 
lutions, well known to have been penned by the author of the Declaration of 
American Independence. In those resolutions, the Legislature of Kentucky 
declare, " that the government created by this compact was not made the exclu- 



6o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

sive of final judge of the extent of the power delegated to itself, since that 
would have made its discretion, and not the Constitution, the measure of its 
powers ; but that, as in all other cases of compact among parties having no com- 
mon judge, each party has an equal right to judge for itself as well of infractions 
as of the mode and measure of redress." * * * 

I should suppose, sir, it would require more self-respect than any gentle- 
man here would be willing to assume, to treat lightly doctrines derived from 
such high sources. Resting on authority like this, I will ask, gentlemen, 
whether South Carolina has not manifested a high regard for the Union, when, 
under a tyranny ten times more grievous than the alien and sedition laws, she 
has hitherto gone no further than to petition, remonstrate, and to solemnly pro- 
test against a series of measures which she believes to be wholly unconstitu- 
tional and utterly destructive of her interests. Sir, South Carolina has not gone 
one step farther than Mr. Jefferson himself was disposed to go, in relation to 
the present subject of our present complaints — not a step farther than the 
statesmen from New England were disposed to go under similar circumstances ; 
no farther than the Senator from Massachusetts himself once considered as 
within " the limits of a constitutional opposition." The doctrine that it is the 
right of a State to judge of the violations of the Constitution on the part of 
the Federal Government, and to protect her citizens from the operations of un- 
constitutional laws, was held by the enlightened citizens of Boston, who assem- 
bled in Faneuil Flail, on the 25th of January, 1809. * * * 

Thus it will be seen, Mr. President, that the South Carolina doctrine is the 
Republican doctrine of '98, — that it was pronuilgated by the fathers of the 
faith, — that it was maintained by Virginia and Kentucky in the worst of times, — 
that it constituted the very pivot on which the political revolution of that day 
turned, — that it embraces the very principles, the triumph of which, at that time, 
saved the Constitution at its last gasp, and which New England statesmen were 
not unwilling to adopt when they believed themselves to be the victims of un- 
constitutional legislation. Sir, as to the doctrine that the Federal Government 
is the exclusive judge of the extent as well as the limitations of its power, it 
seems to me to be utterly subversive of the sovereignty and independence of 
the States. It makes but little difference, in my estimation, whether Congress 
or the Supreme Court are invested with this power. If the Federal Govern- 
ment, in all, or any, of its departments, is to prescribe the limits of its own 
authority, and the States are bound to submit to the decision, and are not to be 
allowed to examine and decide for themselves when the barriers of the Con- 
stitution shall be overleaped, this is practically " a government without limita- 
tion of powers." The States are at once reduced to mere petty corporations. 



FOOT'S RESOLUTION. 



6i 



and the people are entirely at your mercy. I have but one word more to add. 
In all the efforts that have been made by South Carolina to resist the uncon- 
stitutional laws which Congress has extended over them, she has kept steadily in 
view the preservation of the Union, by the only means by which she believes it 
can be long preserved — a firm, manly, and steady resistance against usurpa- 
tion. The measures of the Federal Government have, it is true, prostrated her 
interests, and will soon involve the whole South in irretrievable ruin. But even 
this evil, great as it is, is not the chief ground of our complaints. It is the 
principle involved in the contest — a principle which, substituting the discretion 
of Congress for the limitations of the Constitution, brings the States and the 
people to the feet of the Federal Government, and leaves them nothing they 
can call their own. Sir, if the measures of the Federal Government were less 
oppressive, we should still strive against this usurpation. The South is acting on 
a principle she has always held sacred — resistance to unauthorized taxation. 
These, sir, are the principles which induced the immortal Hampden to resist the 
payment of a tax of twenty shillings. Would twenty shillings have ruined his 
fortune ? No ! but the payment of half of twenty shillings, on the principle on 
which it was demanded, would have made him a slave. Sir, if acting on these 
high motives — if animated by that ardent love of liberty which has always 
been the most prominent trait in the Southern character, we would be hurried 
beyond the bounds of a cold and calculating prudence ; who is there, with one 
noble and generous sentiment in his bosom, who would not be disposed, in the 
language of Burke, to exclaim, " You must pardon something to the spirit of 
liberty ? " 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, January 21, 1830.) 



' » '"to ?'C^ 







62 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOOUEiNCE. 




Reply to HaynCc 

By DANIEL WEBSTER, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1782. died 1852.) 



ROFESSING to be provoked by what he chose to consider a charge 
made by me against South CaroHna, the honorable member, Mr. 
President, has taken up a crusade against New England. Leaving 
altogether the subject of the pui)lic lands, in which his success, per- 
haps, had been neither distinguished nor satisfactory, and letting go, 
also, of the topic of the tarifif, he sallied forth in a general assault on 
the opinions, politics, and parties of New England, as they have been exhibited 
n the last thirty years. * * * 

New England has, at times, so argues the gentleman, held opinions as 
dangerous as those which he now holds. Suppose this were so ; how should he, 
therefore, abuse New England? If he find himself countenanced by acts of 
hers, how is it that, while he relies on these acts, he covers, or seeks to cover, 
their authors with reproach? But, sir, if in the course of forty years, there 
have been undue efifervescences of party in New England, has the same thing 
happened nowhere else? Party animosity and party outrage, not in New 
England, but elsewhere, denounced President Washington, not only as a 
Federalist, but as a Tory, a British agent, a man who in his high ofifice sa.nc- 
tioned corruption. But does the honorable member suppose, if I had a tender 
here who should put such an effusion of wickedness and folly into my hand, 
that I would stand up and read it against the South? Parties ran into great 
heats again in 1799 and 1800. What was said, sir, or rather what was not said, 
in those years, against John Adams, one of the committee that drafted the 
Declaration of Independence, and its admitted ablest defender on the floor of 
Congress? If the gentleman wishes to increase his stores of party abuse and 
frothy violence, if he has a determined proclivity to such pursuits, there are 
treasures of that sort south of the Potomac, much to his taste, yet untouched. 
I shall not touch them. * * * 




Daniel Webster. 



6a masterpieces OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Mr. President, in carrying his warfare, such as it is, into New England, the 
honorable gentleman all along professes to be acting on the defensive. He 
chooses to consider me as having assailed South Carolina, and insists that he 
comes forth only as her champion, and in her defense. Sir, I do not admit that 
I made any attack whatever on South Carolina. Nothing like it. The honor- 
able member, in his first speech, expressed opinions, in regard to revenue and 
some other topics, which I heard with both pain and surprise. I told the gentle- 
man I was aware that such sentiments were entertained out of the Government, 
but had not expected to find them advanced in it ; that I knew there were per- 
sons in the South who speak of our Union with indifiference or doubt, taking 
pains to magnify its evils, and to say nothing of its benefits ; that the honorable 
member himself. I was sure, could never be one of these ; and I regretted the 
expression of such opinions as he had avowed, because I thought their obvious 
tendency was to encourage feelings of disrespect to the Union, and to impair 
its strength. This, sir, is the sum and substance of all I said on the subject. 
And this constitutes the attack which called on the chivalry of the gentleman, 
in his own opinion, to harry us with such a foray among the party pamphlets 
and party proceedings in Massachusetts ! "^ * * I shall not acknowledge that 
the honorable member goes before me in regard for whatever of distinguished 
talent or distinguished character South Carolina has produced. I claim part of 
the honor, I partake in the pride of her great names. I claim them for my 
countrymen, one and all, the Laurenses, the Rutledges, the Pinckneys, the 
Sumpters, the Marions, — Americans all. whose fame is no more to be hemmed 
in by State lines than their talents and ])atriotism were caj^able of l)eing circum- 
scribed within the same narrow limits. In their day and generation they served 
and honored the country and the whole country ; and their renown is of the 
treasures of the whole country. Him whose honored name the gentleman him- 
self bears — does h-e esteem me less capable of gratitude for his patriotism, or 
sympathy for his sufferings, than if his eyes had first opened upon the light of 
Massachusetts, instead of South Carolina? Sir, does he suppose it in his power 
to exhibit a Carolina name so bright as to produce envy in my bosom ? No. 
sir ; increased gratification and delight, rather. I thank God that, if I am gifted 
with little of the spirit which is able to raise mortals to the skies, I have yet 
none, as I trust, of that other spirit which would drag angels down. When I 
shall be found, sir, in my place here in the Senate, or elsewhere, to sneer at 
public merit, because it happens to spring up beyond the little limits of my own 
State or neighborhood ; when I refuse, for any such cause, or for any cause, the 
homage due to American talent, to elevated patriotism, to sincere devotion to 
liberty and the country ; or, if I see an uncommon endowment of Heaven, if I sec 



REPLY TO HAYNE. 65 

extraordinary capacity and virtue, in any son of the South ; and if, moved by 
local prejudices or gangrened by State jealousy, I get up here to abate the tithe 
of a hair from his just character and just fame, may my tongue cleave to the 
roof of my mouth ! 

Sir, let me recur to pleasing recollections ; let me indulge in refreshing re- 
membrances of the past ; let me remind you that, in early times, no States 
cherished greater harmony, both of principle and feeling, than Massachusetts 
and South Carolina. Would to God that harmony might again return ! 
Shoulder to shoulder they went through the Re\olution, hand in hand they 
stood round the administration of Washington, and felt his own great arm lean 
on them for support. Unkind feeling, if it exist, alienation, and distrust, are the 
growth, unnatural to such soils, of false principles since sown. They are weeds, 
the seeds of which that same great arm never scattered. 

Mr. President, I shall enter upon no encomium of Massachusetts ; she needs 
none. There she is. Behold her, and judge for yourselves. There is her 
history ; the world knows it by heart. The past, at least, is secure. There is 
Boston, and Concord, and Lexington, and Bunker Hill ; and there they will 
remain forever. The bones of her sons, falling in the great struggle for Inde- 
pendence, now lie mingled with the soil of every State from New England to 
Georgia, and there they will lie forever. And, sir, where American Liberty raised 
its first voice, and where its youth was nurtured and sustained, there it still lives, 
in the strength of its manhood, and full of its original spirit. If discord and 
disunion shall wound it, if party strife and blind ambition shall hawk and tear 
it, if folly and madness, if uneasiness under salutary and necessary restraint shall 
succeed in separating it from that Union, by which alone its existence is made 
sure, it will stand, in the end, by the side of that cradle in which its infancy was 
rocked; it will stretch forth its arm with whatever of vigor it may still retain, 
over the friends who gather round it; and it will fall at last, if fall it must, 
amidst the profoundest monuments of its own glory, and on the very spot of its 
origin. 

There yet remains to be performed, Mr. President, by far the most grave 
and important duty which I feel to be devolved upon me by this occasion. It 
is to state, and to defend, what I conceive to be the true principles of the Con- 
stitution under which we are here assembled. * * * 

I understand the honorable gentleman from South Carolina to maintain 
that it is a right of the State Legislatures to interfere whenever, in their judg- 
ment, this Government transcends its constitutional limits, and to arrest the 
operation of its laws. 



66 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

I understand him to maintain this right, as a right existing under the Con- 
stitution, not as a right to overthrow it on the ground of extreme necessity, such 
as would justify violent revolution. 

I understand him to maintain an authority on the part of the States, thus to 
mterfere, for the purpose of correcting the exercise of power by the General 
Government^ of checking it and of compelling it to conform to their opinion of 
the extent of its powers. 

I understand him to maintain, that the ultimate power of judging of the 
constitutional extent of its own authority is not lodged exclusively in the Gen- 
eral Government, or any branch of it ; but that, on the contrary, the States may 
lawfully decide for themselves, and each State for itself, whether, in a given case, 
the act of the General Government transcends its power. 

I understand him to insist, that, if the exigencies of the case, in the opinion 
of any State Government, require it, such State Government may, by its own 
sovereign authority, annul an act of the General Government which it deems 
plainly and palpably unconstitutional. 

This is the sum of what I understand from him to be the South Carolina 
doctrine, and the doctrine which he maintains. * * * (Interruption by Mr. 
Hayne.) 

This leads us to inquire into the origin of this Government and the source 
of its power. Whose agent is it? Is it the creature of the State Legislatures, 
or the creature of the people? If the Government of the United States be the 
agent of the State Governments, then they may control it, provided they can 
agree in the manner of controlling it ; if it be the agent of the people, then the 
people alone can control it, restrain it, modify, or reform it. It is observable 
enough, O^n" the doctrine for which the honorable gentleman contends leads 
him to the necessity of maintaining, not only that this General Government is 
the creature of the States, but that it is the creature of each of the States, 
severally, so that each may assert the power for itself of determining whether 
it acts within the limits of its authority. It is the servant of four-and-twenty 
masters, of different wills and different purposes, and yet bound to obey all. 
This absurdity (for it seems no less) arises from a misconception as to the origin 
of this Government and its true character. It is, sir, the people's Constitution, 
the people's Government, made for the people, made by the people, and answer- 
able to the people. The people of the United States have declared that this 
Constitution shall be supreme law. We must either admit the proposition, or 
deny their authority. The States are, unquestionably, sovereign, so far as their 
sovereignty is not affected by this supreme law. But the State Legislatures, as 
political bodies, however sovereign, are yet not sovereign over the people. So 



REPLY TO HAYNE. 67 

far as the people have given power to the General Government, so far the grant 
is unquestionably good, and the Government holds of the people, and not of 
the State Governments. We are all agents of the same supreme power, the 
people. The General Government and the State Governments derive their au- 
thority from the same source. Neither can, in relation to the other, be called 
primary, though one is definite and restricted, and the other general and 
residuary. The National Government possesses those powers which it can be 
shown the people have conferred on it, and no more. All the rest belongs to 
the State Governments, or to the people themselves. So far as the people have 
restrained State sovereignty by the expression of their will, in the Constitution 
of the United States, so far, it must be admitted. State sovereignty is effectually 
controlled. I do not contend that it is, or ought to be, controlled farther. 
The sentiment to which I have referred propounds that State sovereignty is only 
to be controlled by its own " feeling of justice " — that is to say, it is not to be 
controlled at all, for one who is to follow his own feelings is under no legal 
control. Now, however men may think this ought to be, the fact is that the 
people of the United States have chosen to impose control on State sover- 
eignties. There are those, doubtless, who wish they had been left without re- 
straint; but the Constitution has ordered the matter differently. To make war, 
for instance, is an exercise of sovereignty ; but the Constitution declares that 
no State shall make war. To coin money is another exercise of sovereign power ; 
but no State is at liberty to coin money. Again, the Constitution says that no 
sovereign State shall be so sovereign as to make a treaty. These prohibitions, 
it must be confessed, are a control on the State sovereignty of South Carolina, 
as well as of the other States, which does not arise " from her own feelings of 
honorable justice." The opinion referred to, therefore, is in defiance of the 
plainest provisions of the Constitution. 

There are other proceedings of public bodies which have already been 
alluded to, and to which I refer again, for the purpose of ascertaining more fully 
what is the length and breadth of that doctrine denominated the Carolina 
doctrine, which the honorable member has now stood up on this floor to main- 
tain. In one of them I find it resolved, that " the tarifif of 1828, and every other 
tariff designed to promote one branch of industry at the expense of others, is 
contrary to the meaning and intention of the Federal compact, and such a 
dangerous, palpable, and deliberate usurpation of power, by a determined ma- 
joritv, wielding the General Government beyond the limits of its delegated pow- 
ers, as calls upon the States which compose the suffering minority, in their 
sovereign capacity, to exercise the powers which, as sovereigns, necessarily 
devolve upon them when their contract is violated." * * * 



68 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Sir, the human mind is so constituted, that the merits of both sides of a 
controversy appear very clear, and very palpable, to those who respectively 
espouse them ; and both sides usually grow clearer as the controversy advances. 
South Carolina sees unconstitutionality in the tariff ; she sees oppression there 
also, and she sees danger. Pennsylvania, with a vision not less sharp, looks at 
the same tariff, and sees no such thing in it; she sees it all constitutional, all 
useful, all safe. The faith of South Carolina is strengthened by opposition, and 
she now not only sees, but resolves, that the tariff is palpably unconstitutional, 
oppressive, and dangerous ; but Pennsylvania, not to be behind her neighbors, 
and equally willing to strengthen her own faith by a confident asseveration 
resolves, also, and gives to every warm affirmative of South Carolina, a plain, 
downright, Pennsylvania negative. South Carolina, to show the strength and 
unity of her opinion, brings her assembly to a unanimity, within seven voices; 
Pennsylvania, not to be outdone in this respect any more than in others, re- 
duces her dissentient fraction to a single vote. Now, sir, again, I ask the gentle- 
man. What is to be done? Are these States both right? Is he bound to con- 
sider them both right? If not, which is in the wrong? or, rather, which has the 
best right to decide? And if he, and if I, are not to know what the Constitution 
means, and what it is, till those two States Legislatures, and the twenty-two 
others, shall agree in its construction, what have we sworn to, when we have 
sworn to maintain it? I was forcibly struck, sir, with one reflection, as the 
gentleman went on in his speech. He quoted Mr. Madison's resolutions, to 
prove that a State may interfere, in a case of deliberate, palpable, and dangerous 
exercise of a power not granted. The honorable member supposes the tariff 
law to be such an exercise of power ; and that consequently a case has arisen in 
which the State may, if it see fit, interfere by its own law. Now it so happens, 
nevertheless, that Mr. Madison deems this same tariff law quite constitutional. 
Instead of a clear and palpable violation, it is, in his judgment, no violation at 
all. So that, while they use his authority in a hypothetical case, they reject it in 
the very case before them. All this, sir, shows the inherent futility, I had almost 
used a stronger word, of conceding this power of interference to the State, and 
then attempting to secure it from abuse by imposing qualifications of which the 
States themselves are to judge. One of two things is true ; either the laws of the 
Union are beyond the discretion and beyond the control of the States ; or else we 
have no Constitution of General Government, and are thrust back again to the 
days of the Confederation. * * * 

I nuist now beg to ask, sir, whence is this supposed right of the States 
derived ? Where do they find the power to interfere with the laws of the Union ? 
Sir, the opinion which the honorable gentleman maintains is a notion founded 



REPLY TO HAYNE. 69 

in a total misapprehension, in my judgment, of the origin of this Government, 
and of the foundation on which it stands. I hold it to be a popular government, 
ci'ected by the people ; those who administer it, responsible to the people ; and 
itself capable of being amended and modified, just as the people may choose it 
should be. It is as popular, just as truly emanating from the people, as the 
State Governments. It is created for one purpose ; the State Governments for 
another. It has its own powers ; they have theirs. There is no more authority 
with them to arrest the operation of a law of Congress, than with Congress to 
arrest the operation of their laws. We are here to administer a Constitution 
emanating immediately from the people, and trusted by them to our administra- 
tion. It is not the creature of the State Governments. * * * 

This Government, sir, is the independent offspring of the popular will. It 
is not the creature of State Legislatures; nay, more, if the whole truth must be 
told, the people brought it into existence, established it, and have hitherto sup- 
ported it, for the very purpose, amongst others, of imposing certain salutary 
restraints on State sovereignties. The States cannot now make war ; they can- 
not contract alliances ; they cannot make, each for itself, separate regulations of 
commerce ; they cannot lay imposts ; they cannot coin money. If this Con- 
stitution, sir, be the creature of State Legislatures, it must be admitted that it 
has obtained a strange control over the volitions of its creators. 

The people, then, sir, erected this Government. They gave it a Constitu- 
tion, and in that Constitution they have enumerated the powers which they be- 
stow on it. They have made it a limited government. They have defined its 
authority. They have restrained it to the exercise of such powers as are granted ; 
and all others, they declare, are reserved to the States, or the people. But, sir, 
they have not stopped here. If they had, they would have accomplished but 
half their work. No definition can be so clear as to avoid the possibility of 
doubt'; no limitation so precise as to exclude all uncertainty. Who, then, shall 
construe this grant of the people? Who shall interpret their will, where it may 
be supposed they have left it doubtful? With whom do they repose this ulti- 
mate right of deciding on the powers of the Government ? Sir, they have settled 
all this in the fullest manner. They have left it with the Government itself, in 
its appropriate branches. Sir, the very chief end, the main design, for which 
the whole Constitution was framed and adopted, was to establish a government 
that should not be obliged to act through State agency, or depend on State 
opinion or State discretion. The people had had quite enough of that kind of 
government under the Confederation. Under that system, the legal action, the 
application of law to individuals, belonged exclusively to the States. Congress 
could only recommend ; their acts were not of binding force till the States had 



70 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

adopted and sanctioned them. Are we in that condition still? Are we yet at 
the mercy of State discretion and State construction? Sir, if we are, then vain 
will be our attempt to maintain the Constitution under which we sit. 

But, sir, the people have wisely provided, in the Constitution itself, a proper, 
suitable mode and tribunal for settling questions of constitutional law. There 
are in the Constitution grants of powers to Congress, and restrictions on these 
powers. There are also prohibitions on the States. Some authority must, 
therefore, necessarily exist, having the ultimate jurisdiction to fix and ascertain 
the interpretation of these grants, restrictions, and prohibitions. The Consti- 
tution has itself pointed out, ordained, and established that authority. How 
has it accomplished this great and essential end ? By declaring, sir, that " the 
Constitution and the laws of the United States made in pursuance thereof, 
shall be the supreme law of the land, anything in the Constitution or laws of 
any State to the contrary notwithstanding.'' 

This, sir, was the first great step. By this the supremacy of the Consti- 
tution and the laws of the United States is declared. The people so will it. No 
State law is to be valid which comes in conflict with the Constitution, or any 
law of the United States passed in pursuance of it. But who shall decide this 
question of interference? To whom lies the last appeal? This, sir, the Con- 
stitution itself decides, also, by declaring, " that the judicial power shall extend 
to all cases arising under the Constitution and laws of the United States." 
These two provisions cover the whole ground. They are, in truth, the keystone 
of the arch ! With these it is a government, without them a confederation. 
In pursuance of these clear and express provisions, Congress established, at its 
very first session, in the judicial act, a mode for carrying them into full effect, 
and for bringing all questions of constitutional power to the final decision of 
tlie Supreme Court. It then, sir, became a government. It then had the 
means of self-protection ; and l)ut for this, it would, in all probability, have been 
now among things which are past. Having constituted the Government, and 
declared its powers, the people have further said, that, since somebody must 
decide on the extent of these powers, the Government shall itself decide ; sub- 
ject, always, like other popular governments, to its responsibility to the people. 
And now, sir, I repeat, how is it that a State Legislature acquire.= any power to 
Interfere? Who or what gives them the right to say to the people: " We, who 
are your agents and servants for one purpose, will undertake to decide, that your 
other agents and servants, appointed by you for another purpose, have tran- 
scended the authority you gave them ! " The reply would be, I think, not im- 
pertinent : "Who made you a judge over another's servants? To their own 
masters thev stand or fall." * * * 



REPLY TO HAYNE. 71 

For myself, sir, I do not admit the competency of South CaroHna or any 
other State to prescribe my constitutional duty ; or to settle, between me and 
the people, the validity of laws of Congress for which I have voted. I decline 
her umpirage. I have not sworn to siipport the Constitution according to her 
construction of the clauses. I have not stipulated by my oath of office or other- 
wise to come under any responsibility, except to the people, and those whom 
they have appointed to pass upon the question, whether laws, supported by my 
votes, conform to the Constitution of the country. And, sir, if we look to the 
general nature of the case, could anything have been more preposterous than 
to make a government for the whole Union, and yet leave its powers subject, 

not to one interpretation, but to thirteen or twenty-four interpretations ? 
* * * 

And now, Mr. President, let me run the honorable gentleman's doctrine a 
little into its practical application. Let us look at his probable modus operandi. 
If a thing can be done, an ingenious man can tell how it is to be done, and I 
wish to be informed hozv this State interference is to be put in practice, without 
violence, bloodshed, and rebellion. We will take the existing case of the tarifif 
law. South Carolina is said to have made up her opinion upon it. If we do 
not repeal it (as we probably shall not), she will then apply to the case the remedy 
of her doctrine. She will, we must suppose, pass a law of her Legislature, 
declaring the several acts of Congress, usually called the tariff laws, null and 
void, so far as they respect South Carolina, or the citizens thereof. So far, all 
is a paper transaction, and easy enough. But the collector at Charles.ton is 
collecting the duties imposed by these tariff laws. He, therefore, must be 
stopped. The collector will seize the goods if the tariff duties are not paid. 
The State authorities will undertake their rescue, the marshal, with his posse, 
will come to the collector's aid, and here the contest begins. The militia of the 
State will be called out to sustain the Nullifying Act. They will march, sir, 
under a very gallant leader ; for I believe the honorable member himself com- 
mands the militia of that part of the State. He will raise the Nullifying Act 
on his standard, and spread it out as his banner ! It will have a preamble, setting 
forth that the tariff laws are palpable, deliberate, and dangerous violations of 
the Constitution ! He will proceed, with this banner flying, to the custom- 
house in Charleston, 

" All the while. 
Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds." 

Arrived at the custom-house, he will tell the collector that he must collect 
no more duties under any of the tariff laws. This he will be somewhat 



72 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

puzzled to say, by the way, with a grave countenance, considering what hand 
South CaroHna herself had in that of 1816. But, sir, the collector would not, 
probably, desist at his bidding. He would show him the law of Congress, the 
treasury instruction, and his own oath of office. He would say, he should 
perform his duty, come what might. 

Here would ensue a pause ; for they say that a certain stillness precedes 
the tempest. The trumpeter would hold his breath awhile, and before all this 
military array should fall on the custom-house, collector, clerks, and all, it is 
very probable some of those composing it would request of the gallant com- 
mander-in-chief to be informed upon a little point of law ; for they have, doubt- 
less, a just respect for his opinions as a lawyer, as well as for his bravery as a 
soldier. They know he has read Blackstone and the Constitution, as well as 
Turenne and Vauban. They would ask him, therefore, somewhat concerning 
their rights in this matter. They would inf|uire whether it was not somewhat 
dangerous to resist a law of the United States. What would be the nature of 
their offense, they would wish to learn, if they, by military force and array, 
resisted the execution in Carolina of a law of the United States, and it should 
turn out, after all, that the law icas constittttional? He would answer, of course, 
treason. No lawyer could give any other answer. John Fries, he would tell 
them, had learned that some years ago. How, then, they would ask, do you 
propose to defend us ? We are not afraid of bullets, but treason has a way of 
taking people ofif that we do not much relish. How do you propose to defend 
us? " Look at my floating banner," he would reply; " see there the nullifying 
law." 

Is It your opinion, gallant commander, they would then say, that, if we 
should be indicted for treason, that same floating banner of yours would make 
a good plea in bar? " South Carolina is a sovereign State," he would reply. 
That is true; but would the judge admit our plea? "These tariff laws," he 
would repeat, " are unconstitutional, palpably, deliberately, dangerously." That 
may all be so ; but if the tribunal should not happen to be of that opinion, shall 
we swing for it? We are ready to die for our country, but it is rather an 
awkward business, this dying without touching the ground ! After all, that is a 
sort of hemp tax worse than any part of the tariff. 

Mr. President, the honorable gentleman would be in a dilemma, like that 
of another great general. He would have a knot before him which he could 
not untie. He must cut it with his sword. He must say to his followers, 
" Defend yourselves with your bayonets ; " and this is war — civil war. 

Direct collision, therefore, between force and force, is the unavoidable re- 
sult of that remedy for the revision of unconstitutional laws which the gentleman 



REPLY TO HAYNE. 73 

contends for. It must happen in the very first case to which it is appHed. Is 
not this the plain result? To resist by force the execution of a law, generally, 
is treason. Can the courts of the United States take notice of the indulgence 
of a State to commit treason ? The common saying, that a State cannot commit 
treason herself, is nothing to the purpose. Can she authorize others to do it? 

A :); :); 

The people have preserved this, their own chosen Constitution, for forty 
years, and have seen their happiness, prosperity, and renown grow with its 
growth, and strengthen with its strength. They are now, generally, strongly 
attached to it. Overthrown by direct assault, it cannot be ; evaded, undermined, 
nullified, it will not be. if we, and those who shall succeed us here, as agents 
and representatives of the people, shall conscientiously and vigilantly discharge 
the two great branches of our public trust, faithfully to preserve and wisely to 
administer it. 

Mr. President, I have thus stated the reasons of my dissent to the doctrines 
which have been advanced and maintained. I am conscious of having detained 
you and the Senate much too long. I was drawn into the debate with no 
previous deliberation, such as is suited to the discussion of so grave and im- 
portant a subject. But it is a subject of which my heart is full, and I have not 
been willing to suppress the utterance of its spontaneous sentiments. I cannot, 
even now, persuade myself to relinquish it, without expressing, once more, my 
deep conviction, that, since it respects nothing less than the union of the States, 
it is of most vital and essential importance to the public happiness. I profess, 
sir. in my career hitherto, to have kept steadily in view the prosperity and honor 
of the whole country, and the preservation of our Federal Union. It is to that 
Union we owe our safety at home, and our consideration and dignity abroad. 
It is to that Union that we are chiefly indebted for whatever makes us most 
proud of our country. That Union we reached only by the discipline of our 
virtues in the severe school of adversity. It had its origin in the necessities 
of disordered finance, prostrate commerce, and ruined credit. Under its benign 
influences, these great interests immediately awoke, as from the dead, and 
sprang forth with newness of life. Every year of its duration has teemed with 
fresh proofs of its utility and its blessings ; and although our territory has 
stretched out wider and wider, and our population spread farther and farther, 
they have not outrun its protection or its benefits. It has been to us all a 
copious fountain of national, social, and personal happiness. 

I have not allowed myself, sir, to look beyond the Union, to see what 
might lie hidden in the dark recess behind. I have not coolly weighed the 
chances of preserving liberty when the bonds that unite us together shall be 



74 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



broken asunder. I have not accustomed myself to hang over the precipice of 
disunion, to see w^hether, v^ith my short sight, I can fathom the depth of the 
abyss below ; nor could I regard him as a safe counselor in the affairs of this 
Government, whose thoughts should be mainly bent on considering, not how 
the Union may be best preserved, but how tolerable might be the condition 
of the people when it should be broken up and destroyed. While the Union 
lasts we have high, exciting, gratifying prospects spread out before us, for us 
and our children. Beyond that I seek not to penetrate the veil. God grant 
that in my day at least that curtain may not rise ! God grant that on my vision 
never may be opened what lies behind ! When my eyes shall be turned to behold 
for the last time the sun in the heavens, may I not see him shining on the broken 
and dishonored fragments of a once glorious Union; on States dissevered, dis- 
cordant, belligerent; on a land rent with civil feuds, or drenched, it may be, 
in fraternal blood! Let their last feeble and lingering glance rather behold the 
gorgeous ensign of the Republic, now known and honored throughout the 
earth, still full high advanced, its arms and trophies streaming in their original 
lustre, not a stripe erased or polluted, not a single star obscured, bearing for its 
motto, no such miserable interrogatory as " What is all this worth ? " nor those 
other words of delusion and folly, " Liberty first and Union afterward ; " but 
everywhere, spread all over in characters of living light, blazing on all its ample 
folds, as they float over the sea and over the land, and in c^ery wind under the 
whole heavens, that other sentiment, dear to every true American heart, — 
Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable! " 

(Delivered in the United .States .Senate, January 26, 1830.) 





THE POWERS OF WAR AND PEACE. 75 



The Powers of War and Peace. 

By JOHN QUINCY ADAMS, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1767, died 1848.) 



iHERE are, then, Mr. Chairman, in the authority of Congress and of the 
Executive, two classes of powers, altogether dififerent in their nature, 
and often incompatible with each other — the war power and the peace 
power. The peace power is limited by regulations and restricted by 
provisions, prescribed within the Constitution itself. The war power 
is limited only by the laws and usages of nations. The power is tre- 
mendous ; it is strictly constitutional, but it breaks down every barrier so 
anxiously erected for the protection of liberty, of property, and of life. This, sir, 
is the power which authorizes you to pass the resohition now before you, and, 
in my opinion, there is no other. 

And this, sir, is the reason which I was not permitted to give this morning 
for voting with only eight associates against the first resolution reported by 
the committee on the abolition petitions ; not one word of discussion had been 
permitted on either of those resolutions. When called to vote upon the first 
of them, I asked only five minutes of the time of the House to prove that it was 
utterly unfounded. It was not the pleasure of the House to grant me those 
five minutes. Sir, I must say that, in all the proceedings of the House upon 
that report, from the previous question, moved and inflexibly persisted in by a 
member of the committee itself which reported the resolutions (Mr. Owens, of 
Georgia), to the refusal of the Speaker, sustained by the majority of the House, 
to permit the other gentleman, from Georgia (Mr. Glascock) to record upon the 
journal his reasons for asking to be excused from voting on that same resolu- 
tion, the freedom of debate has been stifled in this House to a degree far beyond 
anything that ever happened since the existence of the Constitution of the 
United States ; nor is it a consolator}^ reflection to me how intensely we have 
been made to feel, in the process of that operation, that the Speaker of this 
House is a slaveholder. And, sir, as I was not then permitted to assign my 
reasons for voting against that resolution before I gave the vote, I rejoice that 



76 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

the reason for which I shall vote for the resolution now before the committee is 
identically the same with that for which I voted against that. 

(Mr. Adams at this, and at many other passages of this speech, was inter- 
rupted by calls to order. The chairman of the committee [Mr. A. H. Shepperd, 
of North Carolina], in every instance, decided that he was not out of order, but 
at this passage intimated that he was approaching very close upon its borders ; 
upon which Mr. Adams said. " Then I am to understand, sir, that I am yet 
within the bounds of order, but that I may transcend them hereafter.'") 



And now, sir, am I to be disconcerted and silenced, or admonished by the 
Chair that I am approaching to irrelevant matter, which may warrant him to 
arrest me in my argument, because I sa}" that the reason for which I shall vote 
for the resolution now before the committee, levying a heavy contribution upon 
the property of my constituents, is identically the same with the reason for 
which I voted against the resolution reported by the slavery committee, that 
Congress have no authority to interfere, in any way, with slavery in any of the 
States of this Union. Sir, I was not allowed to give my reasons for that vote, 
and a majority of my constituents, perhaps proportionately as large as that of 
this House in favor of that resolution, may and probably will disapprove my 
vote against, unless my reasons for so voting should be explained to them. I 
asked but five minutes of the House to give those reasons, and was refused. 
I shall, therefore, take the liberty to give them now, as they are strictly ap- 
plicable to the measure now before the committee, and are my only justification 
for voting in favor of this resolution. 

I return, then, to my first position, that there are two classes of powers 
vested by the Constitution of the United States in their Congress and Executive 
Government ; the powers to be exercised in the time of peace, and the powers 
incidental to war. That the powers of peace are limited by provisions within 
the body of the Constitution itself, but that the powers of war are limited and 
regulated only by the laws and usages of nations. There are, indeed, powers 
of peace conferred upon Congress, which also come within the scope and juris- 
diction of the laws of nations, such as the negotiation of treaties of amity and 
commerce, the interchange of public ministers and consuls, and all the personal 
and social intercourse between the individual inhabitants of the United States 
and foreign nations, and the Indian tribes, which require the interposition of 
any law. ' But the powers of war are all regulated by the laws of nations, and 
are subject to no other limitation. It is by this power that I am justified in 
voting the money of my constituents for the immediate relief of their fellow 




John Quincy Adams. 



78 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

citizens suffering with extreme necessity even for subsistence, by the direct con- 
sequence of an Indian war. Upon the same principle, your consuls in foreign 
ports are authorized to provide for the subsistence of seamen in distress, and 
even for their passage to their own country. 

And it was upon that same principle that I voted against the resolution 
reported by the slavery committee, " That Congress possess no constitutional 
authority to interfere, in any way, with the institution of slavery in any of the 
States of this confederacy," to which resolution most of those with whom I 
usually concur, and even my own colleagues in this House, gave their assent. 
1 do not admit that there is even among the peace powers of Congress no such 
authority ; but in war there are many ways by which Congress not only have 
the authority, but are bound to interfere with the institution of slavery in the 
States. The existing law prohibiting the importation of slaves into the United 
States from foreign comitries, is itself an interference with the institution of 
slavery in the States. It was so considered by the founders of the Constitution 
of the United States, in which it was stipulated that Congress should not in- 
terfere, in that way, with the institution, prior to the year 1808. 

During the late war with Great Britain the military and naval commanders 
of that nation issued proclamations inviting the slaves to repair to their standards, 
with promises of freedom and of settlement in some of the British colonial estab- 
lishments. This, surely, was an interference with the institution of slavery in 
the States. By the treaty of peace, Great Britain stipulated to evacuate all the 
forts and places in the United States, without carrying away any slaves. If the 
Government of the United States had no authority to interfere, in any way, 
with the institution of slavery in the States, they would not have had the authorit}- 
to require this stipulation. It is well known that this engagement was not ful- 
filled by the British naval and military commanders ; that, on the contrary, they 
did carry away all the slaves whom they had induced to join them, and that 
the British Government inflexibly refused to restore any of them to their masters ; 
tliat a claim of indemnity was consequently instituted in behalf of the owners of 
the slaves, and was successfully maintained. All that series of transactions was 
an interference by Congress with the institution of slavery in the States in one 
way — in the way of protection and support. It was by the institution of slavery 
alone that the restitution of slaves enticed by proclamations into the British ser- 
vice could be claimed as property. But for the institution of slavery, the British 
commanders could neither have allured them to their standard, nor restored 
them otherwise than as liberated prisoners of war. But for the institution of 
slavery, there could have been no stipulation that they should not be carried 



THE POWERS OF WAR AND PEACE. 



79 



away as property, nor any claim of indemnity for the violation of that engage- 
ment. 

But the war power of Congress over the institution of slavery in the States 
is yet far more extensive. Suppose the case of a servile war, complicated, as 
to some extent it is even now, with an Indian war; suppose Congress were called 
to raise armies, to supply money from the whole Union, to suppress a servile 
insurrection : would they have no authority to interfere with the institution of 
slavery? The issue of a servile war may be disastrous. By war the slave may 
emancipate himself ; it may become necessary for the master to recognize his 
emancipation by a treaty of peace ; can it for an instant be pretended that Con- 
gress, in such a contingency, would have no authority to interfere with the 
institution of slavery, in any way, in the States? Why, it would be equivalent 
to saying that Congress have no constitutional authority to make peace. 

(Delvered in the House of Representatives May 25, 1836.) 




8o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




Nullification and the Force Bill. 

By JOHN C. CALHOUN, of South Carolina. 

(Born 1782. died 1850.) 



'HE people of Carolina believe that the Union is a union of States, and 
not of individuals ; that it was formed by the States, and that the citizens 
of the several States were bound to it through the acts of their several 
States ; that each State ratified the Constitution for itself, and that it 
was only by such ratification of a State that any obligation was im- 
posed upon its citizens. Thus believing, it is the opinion of the people 
of Carolina that it belongs to the State which has imposed the obligation to 
declare, in the last resort, the extent of this obligation, as far as her citizens 
are concerned ; and this upon the plain principles which exist in all analogous 
cases of compact between sovereign bodies. On this principle the people of the 
State, acting in their sovereign capacity in convention — precisely as they did in 
the adoption of their own and the Federal Constitutions — have declared, by the 
ordinance, that the acts of Congress which imposed duties under the authority 
to lay imposts, were acts not for revenue, as intended by the Constitution, but 
for protection, and, therefore, null and void. The ordinance thus enacted by the 
people of the State themselves, acting as a sovereign community, is as obligatory 
on the citizens of the State as any portion of the Constitution. In prescribing, 
then, the oath to obey the ordinance, no more was done than to prescribe an 
oath to obey the Constitution. It is, in fact, but a particular oath of allegiance, 
and in every respect similar to that which is prescribed, under the Constitution 
of the United States, to be administered to all the ofificers of the State and 
Federal Governments ; and is no more deserving the harsh and bitter epithets 
which have been heaped upon it than that or any similar oath. It ought to be 
borne in mind that, according to the opinion which prevails in Carolina, the 
right of resistance to the unconstitutional acts of Congress belongs to the State, 
and not to her individual citizens; and that, though the latter may, in a mere 
question of meum and timm, resist through the courts an unconstitutional en- 



I 




John C. Calhoun. 



82 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

croachment upon their rights, yet the final stand against usurpation rests not 
with them, but with the State of which they are members ; and such act of 
resistance by a State binds the conscience and allegiance of the citizen. But 
there appears to be a general misapprehension as to the extent to which the 
State has acted under this part of the ordinance. Instead of sweeping every 
ofificer by a general proscription of the minority, as has been represented in de- 
bate, as far as my knowledge extends, not a single individual has been removed. 
The State has, in fact, acted with the greatest tenderness, all circumstances con- 
sidered, toward citizens who differed from the majority; and. in that spirit, has 
directed the oath to be administered only in the case of some official act 
directed to be performed in which obedience to the ordinance is involved. * * * 

It is next objected that the enforcing acts have legislated the United States 
out of South Carolina. I have already replied to this objection on another 
occasion, and will now but repeat what I then said: that they have been legis- 
lated out only to the extent that they had no right to enter. The Constitution 
has admitted the jurisdiction of the United States within the limits of the several 
States only so far as the delegated powers authorize ; beyond that they are in- 
truders, and may rightfully be expelled ; and that they have been efficiently ex- 
pelled by the legislation of the State through her civil process, as has been 
acknowledged on all sides in the debate, is only a confirmation of the truth of the 
doctrine for which the majority in Carolina have contended. 

The very point at issue between the two parties there is, whether nullifica- 
tion is a peaceful and an efficient remedy against an unconstitutional act of the 
General Government, and may be asserted, as such, through the State tribunals. 
Both parties agree that the acts against which it is directed are unconstitutional 
and oppressive. The controversy is only as to the means by which our citizens 
may be protected against the acknowledged encroachments on their rights. 
This being the point at issue between the parties, and the very object of the 
majority being an efficient protection of the citizens through the State tribunals, 
the measures adopted to enforce the ordinance, of course received the most 
decisive character. We were not children, to act by halves. Yet for acting thus 
efficiently the State is denounced, and this bill reported, to overrule, by military 
force, the civil tribunal and civil process of the State! Sir, I consider this bill, 
and the arguments which have been urged on this floor in its support, as the 
most triumphant acknowledgment that nullification is peaceful and efficient, 
and so deeply intrenched in the principles of our system, that it cannot be 
assailed but by prostrating the Constitution, and substituting the supremacy of 
military force in lieu of the supremacy of the laws. In fact, the advocates of this 
bill refute their own argument. They tell us that the ordinance is unconstitu- 



NULLIFICATION AND THE FORCE BILL. 83 

tional, that it infracts the Constitution of South Carolina; although, to me, the 
objection appears absurd, as it was adopted by the very authority which adopted 
the Constitution itself. They also tell us that the Supreme Court is the appointed 
arbiter of all controversies between a State and the General Government. Why, 
then, do they not leave this controversy to that tribunal? Why do they not con- 
fide to them the abrogation of the ordinance, and the laws made in pursuance of 
it, and the assertion of that supremacy which they claim for the laws of Con- 
gress ? The State stands pledged to resist no process of the court. Why, then, 
confer on the President the extensive and unlimited powers provided in this 
bill ? Why authorize him to use military force to arrest the civil process of the 
State? But one answer can be given: that, in a contest between the State and 
the General Government, if the resistance be limited on both sides to the civil 
process, the State, by its inherent sovereignty, standing upon its reserved powers, 
will prove too powerful in such a controversy, and must triumph over the 
Federal Government, sustained by its delegated and limited authority ; and in 
this answer we have an acknowledgment of the truth of those great principles 
for which the State has so firmly and nobly contended. * * * 

Notwithstanding all that has been said, I may say that neither the Senator 
from Delaware (Mr. Clayton), nor any other who has spoken on the same side, 
has directly and fairly met the great question at issue: is this a Federal Union? 
a union of States, as distinct from that of individuals? is the sovereignty in the 
several States, or in the American people in the aggregate ? The very language 
which we are compelled to use when speaking of our political institutions, affords 
proof conclusive as to its real character. The terms union, federal, united, all 
imply a combination of sovereignties, a confederation of States. They never 
apply to an association of individuals. Who ever heard of the United State of 
New York, of Massachusetts, or of Virginia? Who ever heard the term federal 
or union applied to the aggregation of individuals into one community? Nor 
is the other point less clear — that the sovereignty is in the several States, and 
that our system is a union of twenty-four sovereign powers, under a constitu- 
tional compact, and not of a divided sovereignty between the States severally 
and the United States? In spite of all that has been said, I maintain that sov- 
ereignty is in its nature indivisible. It is the supreme power in a State, and we 
might just as well speak of half a square, or half of a triangle, as of half a sov- 
ereignty. It is a gross error to confound the exercise of sovereign powers with 
iGvereigiity itself, or the delegation of such powers with the surrender of them. 
A sovereign may delegate his powers to be exercised by as many agents as he 
may think proper, under such conditions and with such limitations as he may 
impose ; but to surrender any portion of his sovereignty to another is to anni- 



84 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

hilate the whole. The Senator from Delaware (Mr. Clayton) calls this metaphysi- 
cal reasoning, which he says he cannot comprehend. If by metaphysics he 
means that scholastic refinement which makes distinctions without difference, 
no one can hold it in more utter contempt than I do; but if, on the contrary, 
he means the power of analysis and combination — that power which reduces 
the most complex idea into its elements, which traces causes to their first prin- 
ciple, and, by the power of generalization and combination, unites the whole in 
one harmonious system — then, so far from deserving contempt, it is the highest 
attribute of the human mind. It is the power which raises man above the 
brute; which distinguishes his faculties from mere sagacity, which he holds in 
common with inferior animals. It is this power which has raised the astronomer 
from being a mere gazer at the stars to the high, intellectual eminence of a 
Newton or a Laplace, and astronomy itself from a mere observation of insulated 
facts into that noble science which displays to our admiration the system of the 
universe. And shall this high power of the mind, which has effected such 
wonders when directed to the laws which control the material world, be forever 
prohibited, under a senseless cry of metaphysics, from being applied to the high 
purposes of political science and legislation? I hold them to be subject to laws 
as fixed as matter itself, and to be as fit a subject for the application of the 
highest intellectual power. Denvmciation may, indeed, fall upon the philosophi- 
cal inquirer into these first principles, as it did upon Galileo and Bacon, when 
they first unfolded the great discoveries which have immortalized their names ; 
but the time will come when truth will prevail in spite of prejudice and denun- 
ciation, and when politics and legislation will be considered as much a science 
as astronomy and chemistry. * * * 

Disguise it as you may, the controversy is one between power and liberty ; 
and I tell the gentlemen who are opposed to me, that, as strong as may be the 
love of power on their side, the love of liberty is still stronger on ours. History 
furnishes many instances of similar struggles, where the love of liberty has pre- 
vailed against power under every disadvantage, and among them few more strik- 
ing than that of our own Revolution ; where, as strong as was the parent 
country, and feeble as were the Colonies, yet, under the impulse of liberty, and 
the blessing of God, they gloriously triumphed in the contest. There are, indeed, 
many striking analogies between that and the present controversy. They both 
originated substantially in the same cause — with this difference: in thjs present 
case, the power of taxation is converted into that of regulating industry ; in the 
other, the power of regulating industry, by the regulation of commerce, was 
attempted to be converted into the power of taxation. Were I to trace the 
analogy further, we should find that the perversion of the taxing power, in the 



\ 



NULLIFICATION AND THE FORCE BILL. 



85 



one case, has given precisely the same control to the Northern section over the 
industry of the Southern section of the Union, which the power to regulate com- 
merce gave to Great Britain over the industry of the Colonies in the other; and 
that the very articles in which the Colonies were permitted to have a free trade, 
iand those in which the mother-country had a monopoly, are almost identically 
the same as those in which the Southern States are permitted to have a free 
trade by the act of 1832, and in which the Northern States have, by the same 
act, secured a monopoly. The only diiiference is in the means. In the former, 
the Colonies were permitted to have a free trade with all countries south of Cape 
Finisterre, a cape in the northern part of Spain; while north of that, the trade 
of the Colonies was prohibited, except through the mother-country, by means 
of her commercial regulations. If we compare the products of the country north 
and south of Cape Finisterre, we shall find them almost identical with the list of 
the protected and unprotected articles contained in the list of last year. Nor 
does the analogy terminate here. The very arguments resorted to at the com- 
mencement of the American Revolution, and the measures adopted, and the 
motives assigned to bring on that contest (to enforce the law), are almost identi- 
cally the same. * * * 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, February 15, 1833.) 





86 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Murder of Lovejoy and the Freedom of the 

Press. 

By WENDELL PHILLIPS, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1811, died 1884.) 



R. CHAIRMAN: We have met for the freest discussion of these 
resolutions, and the events which gave rise to them. (Cries of 
" Question," " Hear him," " Go on," " No gagging." etc.) I hope 
I shall be permitted to express my surprise at the sentiments of the 
last speaker, surprise not only at such sentiments from such a man, 
but at the applause they have received within these walls. A com- 
parison has been drawn between the events of the Revolution and the tragedy 
at Alton. We have heard it asserted here, in Faneuil Hall, that Great Britain 
had a right to tax the colonies, and we have heard the mob at Alton, the drunken 
murderers of Lovejoy, compared to those patriot fathers who threw the tea 
overboard! Fellow citizens, is this Faneuil Hall doctrine? ("No, no.") The 
mob at Alton were met to wrest from a citizen his just rights — met to resist 
the laws. We have been told that our fathers did the same ; and the glorious 
mantle of Revolutionary precedent has been thrown over the mobs of our day. 
To make out their title to such defense, the gentleman says that the British 
Parliament had a right to tax these colonies. It is manifest that, without this, 
his parallel falls to the ground, for Lovejoy had stationed himself within con- 
stitutional bulwarks. He was not only defending the freedom of the press, but 
he was under his own roof, in arms with the sanction of the civil authority. The 
men who assailed him went against and over the laws. The mob, as the gentle- 
man terms it — mob, forsooth ! certainly we sons of the tea-spillers are a 
marvelously patient generation ! — the " orderly mob " which assembled in the 
Old South to destroy the tea, were met to resist, not the laws, but illegal 
enactions. Shame on the American who calls the tea tax and stamp act laws! 
Our fathers resisted, not the King's prerogative, but the King's usurpation. To 
find any other account, you must read our Revolutionary history upside down. 
Our State archives are loaded with arguments of John Adams to prove the 
taxes laid by the British Parliament unconstitutional — beyond its power. It 




Wendell Phillips. 



88 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

was not until this was made out that the men of New England rushed to arms. 
The arguments of the Council Chamber and the House of Representatives pre- 
ceded and sanctioned the contest. To draw the conduct of our ancestors into a 
precedent for mobs, for a right to resist laws we ourselves have enacted, is an 
insult to their memory. The difiference between the excitements of those days 
and our own, which the gentleman in kindness to the latter has overlooked, is 
simply this: the men of that day went for the right, as secured by the laws. 
They were the people rising to sustain the laws and Constitution of the province. 
The rioters of our days go for their own wills, right or wrong. Sir, when I 
heard the gentleman lay down principles which place the murderers of Alton 
side by side with Otis and Hancock, with Quincy and Adams, I thought those 
pictured lips (pointing to the portraits in the hall) would have broken into 
voice to rebuke the recreant American — the slanderer of the dead. The gentle- 
man said that he should sink into insignificance if he dared to gainsay the 
principles of these resolutions. Sir, for the sentiments he has uttered, on soil 
consecrated b}^ the prayers of Puritans and the blood of patriots, the earth should 
have yawned and swallowed him up. 

(By this time, the uproar in the Hall had risen so high that the speech was 
suspended for a short time. Applause and counter applavise, cries of " Take 
that back," " Make him take back recreant," " He sha'n't go on till he takes it 
back," and counter cries of " Phillips or nobody," continued until the pleadings 
of well-known citizens had somewhat restored order, when Mr. Phillips re- 
sumed.) 

Fellow citizens, I cannot take back my words. Surely the Attorney-General, 
so long and so well known here, needs not the aid of your hisses against one so 
young as I am — my voice never before heard within these walls ! * * * 

Men are continually asking each other. Had Lovejoy a right to resist ? Sir, 
I protest against the question instead of answering it. Lovejoy did not resist, 
in the sense they mean. He did not throw himself back on the natural right of 
self-defense. He did not cry anarchy, and let slip the dogs of civil war, careless 
of the horrors which would follow. Sir, as I understand this affair, it was not 
an individual protecting his property ; it was not one body of armed men re- 
sisting another, and making the streets of a peaceful city run blood with their 
contentions. It did not bring back the scenes in some old Italian cities, where 
family met family, and faction met faction, and mutually trampled the laws 
under foot. No ! the men in that house were regularly enrolled, under the 
sanction of the mayor. There being no militia in Alton, about seventy men were 
enrolled with the approbation of the mayor. These relieved each other every 
other night. About thirty men were in arms on the night of the sixth, when 



MURDER OF LOVEJOY AND FREEDOM OF PRESS. 89 

the press was landed. The next evening, it was not thought necessary to sum- 
mon more than half that number; among these was Lovejoy. It was, therefore, 
you perceive, sir, the police of the city resisting rioters — civil government 
breasting itself to the shock of lawless men. 

Here is no question about the right of self-defense. It is, in fact, simply 
this : Has the civil magistrate a right to put down a riot ? 

Some persons seem^ to imagine that anarchy existed at Alton from the 
commencement of these disputes. Not at all. " No one of us," says an eye- 
witness and a comrade of Lovejoy, " has taken ud arms during these disturb- 
ances but at the command of the mayor." Anarchy did not settle down on that 
devoted>^city till Lovejoy breathed his last. Till then the law, represented in 
his person, sustained itself against its foes. When he fell, civil authority was 
trampled under foot. He had " planted himself on his constitutional rights, — 
appealed to the laws, — claimed the protection of the civil authority, — taken 
refuge under the broad shield of the Constitution. When through that he 
was pierced and fell, he fell but one sufferer in a common catastrophe." He 
took refuge under the banner of liberty — amid its folds; and when he fell, its 
glorious stars and stripes, the emblem of free institutions, around which cluster 
so many heart-stirring memories, were blotted out in the martyr's blood. 

It has been stated, perhaps inadvertently, that Lovejoy or his comrades 
fired first. This is denied by those who have the best means of knowing. 
Guns were first fired by the mob. After being twice fired on, those within the 
building consulted together and deliberately returned the fire. But suppose 
they did fire first. They had a right so to do ; not only the right which every 
citizen has to defend himself, but the further right which every civil ofificer 
has to resist violence. Even if Lovejoy fired the first gun, it would not 
lessen his claim to our sympathy, or destroy his title to be considered a martyr 
in defense of a free press. The question now is. Did he act within the Con- 
stitution and the laws? The men who fell in State street, on the 5th of March, 
1770, did more than Lovejoy is charged with. They were the first assailants 
upon some slight quarrel, they pelted the troops with every missile within 
reach. Did this bate one jot of the eulogy with which Hancock and Warren 
hallowed their memory, hailing them as the first martyrs in the cause of Ameri- 
can liberty? If, sir, I had adopted what are called peace principles, I might 
lament the circumstances of this case. But all you who believe as I do, in the 
right and duty of magistrates to execute the laws, join with me and brand as 
base hypocrisy the conduct of those who assemble year after year on the 
4th of July to fight over the battles of the Revolution, and yet " damn with 



90. MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

faint praise " or load with obloquy, the memory of this man who shed his 
blood in defense of life, liberty, property, and the freedom of the press ! 

Throughout that terrible night I find nothing to regret but this, that, 
within the limits of our country, civil authority should have been so prostrated 
as to oblige a citizen to arm in his own defense, and to arm in vain. The gentle- 
man says Lovejoy was presumptuous and imprudent — he "died as the fool 
dieth." And a reverend clergyman of the city tells us that no citizen has a 
right to publish opinions disagreeable to the community! If any mob follows 
such publication, on him rests its guilt. He must wait, forsooth, till the people 
come up to it and agree with him ! This libel on liberty goes on to say that 
the want of right to speak as we think is an evil inseparable from republican 
institutions ! If this be so, what are they worth ? Welcome the despotism of 
the Sultan, where one knows what he may publish and what he may not, rather 
than the tyranny of this many-headed monster, the mob, where we know not 
what we may do or say, till some fellow citizen has tried it, and paid for the 
lesson with his life. This clerical absurdity chooses as a check for the abuses 
of the press, not the lazv, but the dread of a mob. By so doing, it deprives not 
only the individual and the minority of their rights, but the majority also, since 
the expression of their opinion may sometime provoke disturbances from the 
minority. A few men may make a mob as well as many. The majority, then, 
have no right, as Christian men, to utter their sentiments, if by any possibility 
it may lead to a mob ! Shades of Hugh Peters and John Cotton, save us from 
such pulpits ! * * * 

Imagine yourself present when the first news of Bunker Hill battle reached 
a New England town. The tale would have run thus : " The patriots are routed, 
— the redcoats victorious, — Warren lies dead upon the field." With what 
scorn would that Tory have been received, who should have charged Warren 
with imprudence ! who should have said that, bred a physician, he was " out of 
place " in that battle, and " died as the fool dieth." How would the intimation 
have been received, that Warren and his associates should have merited a better 
time? But if success be, indeed, the only criterion of prudence, Respice hnem, — 
wait till the end ! 

Presumptuous to assert the freedom of the press on American ground! Is 
the assertion of such freedom before the age? So much before the age as to 
leave one no right to make it because it displeases the community? Who in- 
vents this libel on his country? It is this very thing which entitles Lovejoy to 
greater praise. The disputed right which provoked the Revolution — taxation 
without representation — is far beneath that for which he died. (Here there 
was a general expression of strong disapprobation.) One word, gentlemen. 



MURDER OF LOVEJOY AND FREEDOM OF PRESS. 91 

As much as thought is better than money, so much is the cause in which Lovejoy 
died nobler than a mere question of taxes. James Otis thundered in this hall 
when the King did but touch his pocket. Imagine, if you can, his indignant 
eloquence had England offered to put a gag upon his lips. The question that 
stirred the Revolution touched our civil interests. This concerns us not only 
as citizens, but as immortal beings. Wrapped up in its fate, saved or lost with 
it, are not only the voice of the statesman, but the instructions of the pulpit and 
the progress of our faith. * * * 

Mr. Chairman, from the bottom of my heart I thank that brave little band 
at Alton for resisting. We must remember that Lovejoy had fled from city to 
city, — suffered the destruction of three presses patiently. At length he took 
counsel with friends, men of character, of tried integrity, of wide views, of 
Christian principle. They thought the crisis had come; it was full time to 
assert the laws. They saw around them, not a community like our own, of 
fixed habits, of character moulded and settled, but one " in the gristle, not yet 
hardened into the bone of manhood." The people there, children of our older 
States, seem to have forgotten the blood-tried principles of their fathers the 
moment they lost sight of our New England hills. Something was to be done 
to show them the priceless value of the freedom of the press, to bring back and 
set right their wandering and confused ideas. He and his advisers looked out 
on a community, staggering like a drunken man, indifferent to their rights and 
confused in their feelings. Deaf to argument, haply they might be stunned 
into sobriety. They saw that of which we cannot judge, the necessity of re- 
sistance. Insulted law called for it. Public opinion, fast hastening on the down- 
ward course, must be arrested. 

Does not the event show they judged rightly? Absorbed in a thousand 
trifles, how has the nation all at once come to a stand? Men begin, as in 1776 
and 1640, to discuss principles, to weigh characters, to find out where they are. 
Haply, we may awake before we are borne over the precipice. 

(Delivered at Faneuil Hall, Boston, December 8, 1837.) 




92 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The American System. 

By HENRY CLAY, of Kentucky. 

(Born 1777, died 1852.) 



HE question which we are now called upon to determine, is not, whether 
we shall establish a new and doubtful system of policy, just proposed, 
and for the first time presented to our consideration, but whether we 
shall break down and destroy a long-established system, carefully and 
patiently built up and sanctioned, during a series of years, again and 
again, by the nation and its highest and most revered authorities. And 
are we not bound deliberately to consider whether we can proceed to this work 
of destruction without a violation of the public faith? The people of the 
United States have justly supposed that the policy of protecting their industry 
against foreign legislation and foreign industry was fully settled, not by a single 
act. but by repeated and deliberate acts of Government, performed at distant 
and frequent intervals. In full confidence that the policy was firmly and un- 
changeably fixed, thousands upon thousands have invested their capital, pur- 
chased a vast amount of real and other estate, made permanent establishments, 
and accommodated their industry. Can we expose to utter and irretrievable ruin 
this countless multitude, without justly incurring the reproach of violating the 
national faith? * * * 

When gentlemen have succeeded in their design of an immediate or gradual 
destruction of the American system, what is their substitute? Free trade! The 
call for free trade is as unavailing as the cry of a spoiled child in its nurse's 
arms, for the moon, or the stars that glitter in the firmament of heaven. It 
never has existed, it never will exist. Trade implies at least two parties. To 
be free, it should be fair, equal, and reciprocal. But if we throw our ports wide 
open to the admission of foreign productions, free of all duty, what ports of 
any other foreign nation shall we find open to the free admission of our surplus 
produce? We may break down all barriers to free trade on our part, but the 
work will not be complete until foreign powers shall have removed theirs. 
There would be freedom on one side, and restrictions, prohibitions, and exclu- 
sions on the other. The bolts and the bars and the chains of all other nations 



THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. 93 

will remain undisturbed. It is, indeed, possible, that our industry and com- 
merce would accommodate themselves to this unequal and unjust state of 
things ; for, such is the flexibility of our nature, that it bends itself to all cir- 
cumstances. The wretched prisoner incarcerated in a jail, after a long time, 
becomes reconciled to his solitude, and regularly notches down the passing 
days of his confinement. 

Gentlemen deceive themselves. It is not free trade that they are recom- 
m.ending to our acceptance. It is, in effect, the British colonial system that we 
are invited to adopt ; and, if their policy prevails, it will lead substantially to 
the recolonization of these States, under the commercial dominion of Great 
Britain. * * * 

I regret, Mr. President, that one topic has, I think, unnecessarily been intro- 
duced into this debate. I allude to the charge brought against the manufactur- 
ing system, as favoring the growth of aristocracy. If it were true, would gentle- 
men prefer supporting foreign accumulations of wealth by that description of 
industry, rather than in their own country? But is it correct? The joint-stock 
companies of the North, as I understand them, are nothing more than associa- 
tions, sometimes of hundreds, by means of which the small earnings of many 
are brought into a common stock, and the associates, obtaining corporate privi- 
leges, are enabled to prosecute, under one superintending head, their business 
to better advantage. Nothing can be more essentially democratic or better 
devised to counterpoise the influence of individual wealth. In Kentucky, almost 
every manufactory known to me is in the hands of enterprising and self-made 
men, who have acquired whatever wealth they possess by patient and diligent 
labor. Comparisons are odious, and but in defense would not be made by me. 
But is there more tendency to aristocracy in a manufactory, supporting hun- 
dreds of freemen, or in a cotton plantation, with its not less numerous slaves, 
sustaining perhaps only two white families — that of the master and the overseer? 

I pass, with pleasure, from this disagreeable topic, to two general propo- 
sitions which cover the entire ground of debate. The first is, that, under the 
operation of the American system, the objects which it protects and fosters 
are brought to the consumer at cheaper prices than they commanded prior to 
its introduction, or, than they would command if it did not exist. If that be 
true, ought not the country to be contented and satisfied with the system, un- 
less the second proposition, which I mean presently also to consider, is un- 
founded? And that is, that the tendency of the system is to sustain, and that 
it has upheld, the prices of all our agricultural and other produce, including 
cotton. 



94 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

And is the fact not indisputable that all essential objects of consumption 
affected by the tariff are cheaper and better since the act of 1824 than they 
were for several years prior to that law? I appeal for its truth to common ob- 
servation, and to all practical men. I appeal to the farmer of the country 
whether he does not purchase on better terms his iron, salt, brown sugar, cotton 
goods, and woollens, for his laboring people? And I ask the cotton-planter if 
he has not been better and more cheaply supplied with his cotton-bagging? In 
regard to this latter article, the gentleman from South Carolina was mistaken 
in supposing that I complained that, under the existing duty, the Kentucky 
manufacturer could not compete with the Scotch. The Kentuckian furnishes a 
more substantial and a cheaper article, and at a more uniform and regular 
price. But it was the frauds, the violations of law, of which I did complain ; not 
smuggling, in the common sense of that practice, which has something bold, 
daring, and enterprising in it, but mean, barefaced cheating, by fraudulent in- 
voices and false denominations. 

I plant myself upon this fact, of cheapness and superiority, as upon im- 
pregnable ground. Gentlemen may tax their ingenuity, and produce a thou- 
sand speculative solutions of the fact, but' the fact itself will remain undis- 
turbed. Let us look into some particulars. The total consumption of bar-iron 
in the United States is supposed to be about 146,000 tons, of which 112,866 tons 
are made within the country, and the residue imported. The number of men 
employed in the manufacture is estimated at 29,254, and the total number of 
persons subsisting by it at 146,273. The measure of protection extended to this 
necessary article was never fully adequate until the passage of the act of 1828; 
and what has been the consequence? The annual increase of quantity since 
that period has been in a ratio of near 25 per centum, and the wholesale price 
of bar-iron in the Northern cities ,was, in 1828, $105 per ton; in 1829, $100; in 
1830, $90; and in 1831, from $85 to $75 — constantly diminishing. We import 
very little English iron, and that which we do is very inferior, and only adapted 
to a few purposes. In instituting a comparison between that inferior article and 
our superior iron, subjects entirely different are compared. They are made 
by different processes. The English cannot make iron of equal quality to ours 
at a less price than we do. They have three classes, best-best, and best, and 
ordinary. It is the latter which is imported. Of the whole amount imported 
there is only about four thousand tons of foreign iron that pays the high duty, 
the residue paying only a duty of about thirty per centum, estimated on the 
prices of the importation of 1829. Our iron ore is superior to that of Great 
Britain, yielding often from sixty to eighty per centum, while theirs produces 



THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. 95 

only about twenty-five. This fact is so well known that I have heard of recent 
exportations of iron ore to England. 

It has been alleged that bar-iron, being a raw material, ought to be admitted 
free, or with low duties, for the sake of the manufacturers themselves. But I 
take this to be the true principle : that if our country is producing a raw mate- 
rial of prime necessity, and with reasonable protection can produce it in sufficient 
quantity to supply our wants, that raw material ought to be protected, although 
it may be proper to protect the article also out of which it is manufactured. 
The -tailor will ask protection for himself, but wishes it denied to the grower of 
wool and the manufacturer of broadcloth. The cotton-planter enjoys pro- 
tection for the raw material, but does not desire it to be extended to the cotton 
manufacturer. The shipbuilder will ask protection for navigation, but does 
not wish it extended to the essential articles which enter into the construction 
of his ship. Each in his proper vocation solicits protection, but would have it 
denied to all other interests which are supposed to come into collision with 
his. * * * 

I hold in my hand a statement, derived from the most authentic source, 
showing that the identical description of cotton cloth, which sold in 1817 at 
twenty-nine cents per yard, was sold in 1819 at twenty-one cents, in 1821 at 
nineteen and a half cents, in 1823 at seventeen cents, in 1825 at fourteen and a 
half cents, in 1827 at thirteen cents, in 1829 at nine cents, in 1830 at nine and a 
half cents, and in 1831 at from ten and a half to eleven cents. Such is the wonder- 
ful effect of protection, competition, and improvement in skill, combined. The 
year 1829 was one of some suffering to this branch of industry, probably owing 
to the principle of competition being pushed too far. Hence we observe a small 
rise of the article of the next two years. The introduction of calico-printing into 
the United States constitutes an important era in our manufacturing industry. 
It commenced about the year 1825, and has since made such astonishing advances, 
that the whole quantity now annually printed is but little short of forty millions 
of yards — about two-thirds of our whole consumption. * * * 

In respect to woollens, every gentleman's own observation and experience 
will enable him to judge of the great reduction of price which has taken place 
in most of these articles since the tariff of 1824. It would have been still greater, 
but for the high duty on raw material, imposed for the particular benefit of the 
farming interest. But, without going into particular details, I shall limit myself 
to inviting the attention of the Senate to a single article of general and 
necessary use. The protection given to flannels in 1828 was fully adequate. It 
has enabled the American manufacturer to obtain complete possession of the 



96 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

American market ; and now, let us look at the effect. I have before me a statement 
from a highly respectable mercantile house, showing the price of four descrip- 
tions of flannels during six years. The average price of them, in 1826, was 
thirty-eight and three-quarter cents; in 1827, thirty-eight; in 1828 (the year of 
the tariff), forty-six; in 1829, thirty-six; in 1830 (notwithstanding the advance 
in the price of wool), thirtj^-two ; and in 1831, thirty-two and one-quarter. These 
facts require no comments. I have before me another statement of a practical 
and respectable man, well versed in the flannel manufacture in America and 
England, demonstrating that the cost of manufacture is precisely the same 
in both countries ; and that, although a yard of flannel which would sell in Eng- 
land at fifteen cents would command here twenty-two, the difference of seven 
cents is the exact difference between the cost in the two countries of the six 
ounces of wool contained in a yard of flannel. 

Brown sugar, during ten years, from 1792 to 1802, with a duty of one and 
a half cents per pound, averaged fourteen cents per pound. The same article, 
during ten years, from 1820 to 1830, with a duty of three cents, has averaged only 
eight cents per pound. Nails, with a duty of live cents per pound, are selling 
at six cents. Window-glass, eight by ten, prior to the tariff of 1824, sold at 
twelve or thirteen dollars per hundred feet ; it now sells for three dollars and 
seventy-five cents. * * * 

This brings me to consider what I apprehend to have been the most efficient 
of all the causes in the reduction of the prices of manufactured articles, and that 
is COMPETITION. By competition the total amount of the supply is increased, 
and by increase of the supply a competition in the sale ensues, and this enables the 
consumer to buy at lower rates. Of all human powers operating on the affairs 
of mankind, none is greater than that of competition. It is action and reaction. 
It operates between individuals of the same nation, and between different nations. 
It resembles the meeting of the mountain torrent, grooving, by its precipitous 
motion, its own channel, and ocean's tide? Unopposed, it sweeps everything 
before it; but, counterpoised, the waters become calm, safe, and regular. It is 
like the segments of a circle or an arch ; taken separately, each is nothing ; but 
in their combination they produce efficiency, symmetry, and perfection. By the 
American system this vast power has been excited in America, and brought into 
being to act in co-operation or collision with European industry. Europe acts 
within itself, and with America ; and America acts within itself, and with Europe. 
The consequence is the reduction of prices in both hemispheres. Nor is it fair to 
argue from the reduction of prices in Europe to her own presumed skill and 
labor exclusively. We affect her prices, and she affects ours. This must always 



THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. 97 

be the case, at least in reference to any articles as to which there is not a total non- 
intercourse ; and if our industry by diminishing the demand for her supplies, 
should produce a diminution in the price of those supplies, it would be very 
unfair to ascribe that reduction to her ingenuity, instead of placing it to the 
credit of our own skill and excited industry. * * * 

The great law of price is determined by supply and demand. What affects 
either affects the price. If the supply is increased, the demand remaining the 
same, the price declines ; if the demand is increased, the supply remaining the 
same, the price advances ; if both supply and demand are undiminished, the price 
is stationary, and the price is influenced exactly in proportion to the degree of 
disturbance to the demand or supply. It is, therefore, a great error to suppose 
that an existing or new duty necessarily becomes a component element to its 
exact amount of price. If the proportions of demand and supply are varied by the 
duty, either in augmenting the supply or diminishing the demand, or vice versa, 
the price is afifected to the extent of that variation. But the duty never becomes 
an integral part of the price, except in the instances where the demand and the 
supply remain after the duty is imposed precisely what they were before, or the 
demand is increased, and the supply remains stationary. 

Competition, therefore, wherever existing, whether at home or abroad, is 
the parent cause of cheapness. If a high duty excites production at home, and the 
quantity of the domestic article exceeds the amount which had been previously 
imported, the price will fall. * * * 

But it is argued that if, by the skill, experience, and perfection which we have 
acquired in certain branches of manufacture, they can be made as cheap as similar 
articles abroad, and enter fairly into competition with them, why not repeal the 
duties as to those articles? And why should we? Assuming the truth of the 
supposition, the foreign article would not be introduced in the regular course 
of trade, but would remain excluded by the possession of the home market, while 
the domestic article had obtained. The repeal, therefore, would have no legiti- 
mate effect. But might not the foreign article be imported in vast quantities, 
to glut our markets, break downpour establishments, and ultimately to enable 
the foreigner to monopolize the supply of our consumption? America is the 
greatest foreign market for European manufactures. It is that to which Euro- 
pean attention is constantly directed. If a great house becomes bankrupt there, 
its storehouses are emptied, and the goods are shipped to America, where, in 
consequence of our auctions, and our custom-house credits, the greatest facilities 
are afforded in the sale of them. Combinations among manufacturers might take 
place, or even the operations of foreign governments might be directed to the 



98 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

destruction of our establishments. A repeal, therefore, of one protecting duty, 
from some one or all of these causes, would be followed by flooding the country 
with the foreign fabric, surcharging the market, reducing the price, and a com- 
plete prostration of our manufactories; after which the foreigner would leisurely 
look about to indemnify himself in the increased prices which he wovild be enabled 
to command by his monopoly of the supply of our consumption. What Ameri- 
can citizen, after the Government had displayed this vacillating policy, would be 
again tempted to place the smallest confidence in the public faith, and adventure 
once more into this branch of industry? * * * 

I feel most sensibly, Mr. President, how much I have trespassed upon 
the Senate. My apology is a deep and deliberate conviction, that the great 
cause under debate involves the prosperity and the destiny of the Union. 
But the best requital I can make, for the friendly indulgence which has been 
extended to me by the Senate, and for which I shall ever retain sentiments 
of lasting gratitude, is to proceed with as little delay as practicable, to the con- 
clusion of a discourse which has not been more tedious to the Senate than 
exhausting to me. I have now to consider the remaining of the two propo- 
sitions which I have already announced. That is — 

Second, that under the operation of the American system, the products of 
our agriculture command a higher price than they would do without it, by 
the creation of a home market, and by the augmentation of wealth produced 
by manufacturing industry, which enlarges our powers of consumption both 
of domestic and foreign articles. The importance of the home market is 
among the established maxims which are universally recognized by all writers 
and all men. However some may differ as to the relative advantages of the 
foreign and the home market, none deny to the latter great value and high 
consideration. It is nearer to us ; beyond the control of foreign legislation ; 
and undisturbed by those vicissitudes to which all international intercourse is 
more or less exposed. The most stupid are sensible of the benefit of a resi- 
dence in the vicinity of a large manufactory, or of a market-town, of a good 
road, or of a navigable stream, which connects their farms with some great 
capital. * * * But let us quit this field of theory, clear as it is, and look 
at the practical operation of the system of protection, beginning with the most 
valuable staple of our agriculture. 

In considering this staple, the first circumstance that excites our surprise 
is the rapidity with which the amount of it has annually increased. Does not 
this fact, however, demonstrate that the cultivation of it could not have been 
so very unprofitable? If the business were ruinous, would more and more 
have annually engaged in it? The quantity in 1816 was eighty-one millions of 



THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. 99 

pounds; in 1826, two hundred and four millions; and in 1830, near three hun- 
dred millions ! The ground of greatest surprise is that it has been able to 
sustain even its present price with such an enormous augmentation of quan- 
tity. It could not have been done but for the combined operation of three 
causes, by which the consumption of cotton fabrics has been greatly extended 
in consequence of their reduced prices : first, competition ; second, the improve- 
ment of labor-saving machinery ; and thirdly, the low price of the raw material. 
The crop of 18 19, amounting to eighty-eight millions of pounds, produced 
twenty-one millions of dollars ; the crop of 1823, when the amount was swelled 
to one hundred and seventy-four millions (almost double of that of 1819), pro- 
duced a less sum by more than half a million of dollars ; and the crop of 1824, 
amounting to thirty millions of pounds less than that of the preceding year, 
produced a million and a half of dollars more. 

If there be any foundation for the established law of price, supply, and 
demand, ought not the fact of this great increase of the supply to account sat- 
isfactorily for the alleged low price of cotton? * * * 

Let us suppose that the home demand for cotton, which has been created 
by the American system, should cease, and that the two hundred thousand 
bales which the home market now absorbs were now thrown into the glutted 
markets of foreign countries ; would not the efifect inevitably be to produce a 
further and great reduction in the price of the article? If there be any truth 
in the facts and principles which I have before stated and endeavored to illus- 
trate, it cannot be doubted that the existence of American manufactures has 
tended to increase the demand and extend the consumption of the raw ma- 
terial ; and that, but for this increased demand, the price of the article would 
have fallen possibly one-half lower than it now is. The error of the opposite 
argument is in assuming one thing, which being denied, the whole fails — 
that is, it assumes that the whole labor of the United States would be profit- 
ably employed without manufactures. Now, the truth is that the system 
excites and creates labor, and this labor creates wealth, and this new wealth 
communicates additional ability to consume, which acts on all the objects con- 
tributing to human comfort and enjoyment. The amount of cotton imported 
into the two ports of Boston and Providence alone during the last year (and 
it was imported exclusively for the home manufacture) was one hundred and 
nine thousand five hundred and seventeen bales. * * * 

I could extend and dwell on the long list of articles — the hemp, iron, 
lead, coal, and other items — for which a demand is created in the home mar- 
ket by the operation of the American system ; but I should exhaust the patience 
of the Senate. Where, where should we find a market for all these articles, 

LofC. 



lOO MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

if it did not exist at home? What would be the condition oi the largest por- 
tion of our people, and of the territory, if this home market were annihilated? 
How could they be supplied with objects of prime necessity? What would 
not be the certain and inevitable decline in the price of all these articles, but 
for the home market? And allow me, Mr. President, to say, that of all the 
agricultural parts of the United States which are benefited by the operation 
of this system, none are equally so with those, which border the Chesapeake 
Bay, the lower parts of North Carolina, Virginia, and the two shores of Mary- 
land. Their facilities of transportation, and proximity to the North, give them 
decided advantages. 

But if all this reasonmg were totally fallaciovis ; if the price of manufac- 
tured articles were really higher, under the American system, than without 
it, I should still argue that high or low prices were themselves relative — 
relative to the ability to pay them. It is in vain to tempt, to tantalize us with 
the lower prices of European fabrics than our own, if we have nothing where- 
with to purchase them. If, by the home exchanges, we can be supplied with 
necessary, even if they are dearer and worse, articles of American produc- 
tion than the foreign, it is better than not to be supplied at all. And how 
would the large portion of our country, which I have described, be supplied, 
but for the home exchanges? A poor people, destitute of wealth or of ex- 
changeable commodities, have nothing to purchase foreign fabrics with. To 
them they are equally beyond their reach, whether their cost be a dollar or a 
guinea. "•' * "^ I conclude this part of the argument with the hope that my 
humble exertions have not been altogether unsuccessful in showing : 

First, that the policy which we have been considering ought to continue 
to be regarded as the genuine American system. 

Secondly, that the free-trade system, which is proposed as its substitute, 
ought really to be considered as the British colonial system. 

Thirdly, that the American system is beneficial to all parts of the Union, 
and absolutely necessary to much the larger portion. 

Fourthly, that the price of the great staple of cotton, and of all our chief 
productions of agriculture, has been sustained and upheld, and a decline 
averted, by the protective system. 

Fifthly, that if the foreign demand for cotton has been at all diminished, 
the diminution has been more than compensated in the additional demand 
created at home. 

Sixthly, that the constant tendency of the system, by creating competition 
among ourselves, and between American and European industry, reciprocally 
acting upon each other, is to reduce prices of manufactured objects. 



THE AMERICAN SYSTEM. 



lOI 



Seventhly, that, in point of fact, objects within the scope of the poHcy 
of protection have greatly fallen in price. 

Eighthly, that if, in a season of peace, these benefits are experienced, in 
a season of war, when the foreign supply might be cut off, they would be much 
more extensively felt. 

Ninthly, and finally, that the substitution of the British colonial system 
for the American system, without benefiting any section of the Union, by 
subjecting us to a foreign legislation, regulated by foreign interests, would 
lead to the prostration of our manufactories, general impoverishment, and 
ultimate ruin. * * * 



(Delivered in the United States Senate, February 2-6, 1832.) 





102 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Education of the People. 

By EDWARD EVERETT, of Massachusetts. 

(Bom 1794, died 1865.) 



T is usual to compare the culture of the mind to the culture of the earth. 
If the husbandman relax his labors, and his field be left untilled, this 
year or the next, although a crop or two be lost, the evil may be 
remedied. The land, with its productive qualities, remains. If not 
plowed and planted this year, it may be the year after. But if the 
mind be wholly neglected during the period most proper for its culti- 
vation, if it be suffered to remain dark and uninformed, its vital power perishes ; 
for all the purposes of an intellectual nature, it is lost. It is as if an earthquake 
had swallowed up the uncultivated fallows, or as if a swollen river had washed 
away, not merely the standing crop, but the bank on which it was growing. 
When the time for education has gone by, the man must, in ordinary cases, be 
launched upon the world a benighted being, scarcely elevated above the beasts 
that perish ; and all that he could have been and done for society and for him- 
self is wholly lost. 

Although this utter sacrifice of the intellectual nature is rarely made in 
this part of the country, I fear there exists, even here, a woeful waste of mental 
power, through neglect of education. Taking our population as a whole, I 
fear that there is not nearly time enough passed at school ; that many of those 
employed in the business of instruction are incompetent to the work ; and that 
our best teachers are not sufficiently furnished with literary apparatus, particu- 
larly with school libraries. If these defects could be supplied, I believe a few 
years would witness a wonderful effect upon the community ; that an impulse, 
not easily conceived beforehand, would be given to individual and social 
character. 

I am strongly convinced that it behooves our ancient commonwealth to 
look anxiously to this subject, if she wishes to maintain her honorable standing 
in this Union of States. I am not grieved when I behold on the map the 




Edward Everett. 



104 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

enormous dimensions of some of the new States in the West, as contrasted with 
the narrow Httle strip which comprises the good old Bay State. They are bone 
of our bone, and flesh of our flesh ; their welfare is closely interwoven with ours ; 
in everything that can promote their solid prosperity, I bid them God-speed with 
all my heart. I hear, without discontent, the astonishing accounts of their 
fertility ; that their vast prairies are covered with more feet of rich vegetable 
mold than our soil, on an average, can boast of inches; and I can bear to hear 
it said, without envy, that their Missouri and Mississippi, the mighty Abana 
and Pharpar of the West, are better than all the waters of our poor New Eng- 
land Israel. 

All this I can bear ; but I cannot bear that our beloved native State, whose 
corner-stone was laid upon an intellectual and moral basis, should deprive itself, 
by its own neglect, of the great counterpoise to these physical advantages. 
Give the sons of Massachusetts, small and comparatively unfertile as she is, the 
means of a good education, and they will stand against the world. Give me the 
means of educating my children, and I will not exchange its thirstiest sands, nor 
its barest peak, for the most fertile spot on earth, deprived of those blessings. 
I would rather occupy the bleakest nook of the mountain that towers above us, 
with the wild wolf and the rattlesnake for my nearest neighbors, with a village 
school, well kept, at the bottom of the hill, than dwell in a paradise of fertility, 
if I must bring up my children in lazy, pampered, self-sufificient ignorance. A 
man may protect himself against the rattle and the venom ; but if he unneces- 
sarily leaves the mind of his offspring a prey to ignorance, and the vices that 
too often follow in its train, he may find, too late for remedy, 

" How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is 
To have a thankless child." 

A thankless child ! No ; I will not wrong him. He may be anything else 
that is bad, but he cannot be a thankless child. What has he to be thankful for? 
No ! the man who unnecessarily deprives his son of education, and thus know- 
ingly trains him up in the way he should not go, may have a perverse, an in- 
tractable, a prodigal child, one who will bring down his gray hairs with sorrow 
to the grave ; but a thankless child he cannot have. 

As I have said, I think this matter must be looked to. If the all-important 
duty of training the young is intrusted to the cheapest hand that can be hired 
to do the work, — to one who is barely able to pass a nominal examination, by 
a committee sometimes more ignorant than himself, in the modinun of learning 
prescribed by law ; and slender as the privilege of such instruction is, if it be 



THE EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. 105 

enjoyed by our children but for ten or twelve weeks in the year, as is the case 
in too many towns in the commonwealth, it is plain to see that they are deprived 
of the best part of their birthright. I know it is said that these few weeks, in 
the depth of winter, are all of his children's time that the frugal husbandman 
can spare. But can it be so? Can the labors of the field, or any other labors, 
be so hotly pressed among us, that ten or twelve weeks are all the time for 
which the labor of the youth of both sexes can be dispensed with, for five or six 
hours a day? I speak with diffidence on the subject; but such, I apprehend, 
cannot be the case. I cannot but think that a majority of the citizens of Massa- 
chusetts, of all pursuits and callings, might, without the least detriment to their 
interests, send their children steadily to a good school seven months in the year, 
and more or less of the time the other five. Without detriment, did I say? 
Nay, with incalculable advantage to their children, to themselves, and to the 
State. 

It would be more rational to talk about not affording seed-corn than to talk 
about not affording our children as much of their time as is necessary for their 
education. What! shall a man plant his field, and allow his child's intellect to 
run to weeds? It would be as wise to eat up all the wheat, and sow the husks 
and the chaff for next year's crop, as, on a principle of thrift, to sow ignorance 
and its attendant helplessness and prejudices in your children's minds, and ex- 
pect to reap an honorable and a happy manhood. It would be better husbandry 
to go, in the summer, and clatter with a hoe in the bare gravel, where nothing 
was ever sown but the feathered seed of the Canada thistle, which the west wind 
drops from its sweeping wings, and come back, in autumn, and expect to find a 
field of yellow grain nodding to the sickle, than to allow your son to grow up 
without useful knowledge, and expect that he will sustain himself with respecta- 
bility in life, or (if consideration must be had of self-interest) prop and comfort 
your decline. Not spare our children's time ! Spare it, I might ask you, from 
what ? Is anything more important ? Spare it for what ? Can it be better em- 
ployed than in that cultivation of the mind which will vastly increase the value 
of every subsequent hour of life ? And to confine them, in the morning of their 
days, to a round of labor for the meat that perisheth, is it not, when our children 
ask for bread, to give them a stone? when they ask for a fish, to give them a 
serpent, which will sting our bosoms as well as theirs? 

Our governments, as well as individuals, have, I must needs say, a duty to 
discharge to the cause of education. Something has been done — by some of 
the State Governments much has been done — for this cause ; but too much, I 
fear, remains undone. In the main, in appropriating the public funds, we tread 



io6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

too much in the footsteps of European precedents. I could wish our legislators 
might be animated with a purer ambition. In other parts of the world, the 
resources of the State, too often wrung from their rightful possessors, are 
squandered on the luxury of governments, built up into the walls of stately 
palaces or massy fortifications, devoured by mighty armies, sunk by overgrown 
navies to the bottom of the sea, swallowed up in the eternal wars of State policy. 
The treasure expended in a grand campaign of the armies of the leading States 
of Europe would send a schoolmaster to every hamlet, from Archangel to Lis- 
bon. The annual expense of supporting the armies and navies of Great Britain 
and France, if applied to the relief and education of the poor in those countries, 
would change the character of the age in which we live. Perhaps, it is too 
much to hope that, in the present condition of the politics of Europe, this system 
can be departed from. It seems to be admitted, as a fundamental maxim of 
international law among its governments, that the whole energy of their civiliza- 
tion must be exhausted in preventing them from destroying each other. With 
us, on the contrary, while the union of the States is preserved (and Heaven grant 
it may be perpetual), there is nothing to prevent the appropriation, to moral 
and intellectual objects, of a great part of those resources which are elsewhere 
lavished on luxury and war. 

How devoutly is it to be wished that we could feel the beauty and dignity 
of such a policy, and aim at a new development of national character ! From 
the earliest period of history, the mighty power of the association of millions of 
men into a people, moved by one political will, has been applied to objects at 
which humanity weeps, and which, were they not written on every page of the 
world's experience, would be absolutely incredible. From time to time a per- 
sonal gathering is witnessed ; mighty numbers of the population assemble en 
masse. Doubtless, it is some noble work which they are going to achieve. 
Marshaled beneath gay and joyous banners, cheered with the soul-stirring strains 
of music, honored, admired, behold how they move forward, the flower of the 
community, clothed, fed, and paid, at the public expense, to some grand under- 
taking ! They go not empty-handed ; their approach is discerned afar by a 
forest of glittering steel above their heads, and the earth groans beneath their 
trains of enginery, of strange form and superhuman power. What errand of 
love has called them out, the elected host, to go in person, side by side, and 
unite the mighty mass of their physical powers in one vast efifort? Let the 
sharp volley that rings along the lines ; let the scarcely mimic thunder which 
rends the sky; let the agonizing shrieks which rise from torn and trampled 
thousands, — return the answer. Their errand is death. They go, not to create, 



THE EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. 107 

but to destroy ; to waste and to slay ; to blast the works of civilization and peace ; 
to wrap cities in flames ; and to cover fertile fields with bloody ashes. 

I cannot, will not, believe that social man can rise no higher than this ; that 
reason and experience, self-interest and humanity, the light of nature, the 
progress of knowledge, and the word of God, will forever prove too feeble for 
this monstrous perversion of human energy. I must believe that the day will 
yet dawn when the greatest efforts of individual and social man will be turned to 
the promotion of the welfare of his brother man. If this hope is to be realized, 
it must be by the joint action of enlightened reason, elevated morals, and pure 
religion, brought home, by a liberal and efficient system of education and the 
aid of Heaven, to every fireside and every heart. 

Amidst much to awaken solicitude in the condition of things in our beloved 
country as respects the progress of improvement, there is yet many a spot within 
its borders sacred to better hopes and higher anticipations. Let us dwell, for a 
moment, on the phenomena which have been exhibited on the spot where we 
are now assembled. Scarcely eighty years have elapsed since this village was 
the site of a small frontier post. Nothing which could be called settlement had 
crossed Connecticut river. The pioneers of civilization had begun to find their 
way into Berkshire, but they hardly ventured beyond the reach of the line of 
forts which guarded the frontier. Sheffield and Stockbridge were, I believe, the 
only towns incorporated before the old French War; and beyond them, west- 
ward, commenced the dreary wilderness ; pathless, except as it was threaded 
by war parties from Canada and New England, and by bands of wretched cap- 
tives, dragged from their homes, at midnight, to a miserable slavery among the 
French and Indians. The alternate action of the two nations who stood at the 
head of the civilization of the world, had been felt for a century in these still 
valleys and venerable forests ; but it was felt only to add the arts of civilized 
destruction to the horrors of savage warfare. One century of peaceful improve- 
ment and hopeful progress was blotted from the history of this portion of 
frontier America. 

But the seeds of improvement were sown even in this bloody soil. One 
of those generous spirits who, from time to time, are raised up to accomplish 
great objects, was stationed in this corner of the commonwealth, in command 
of the line of forts erected for border defense. You know that I allude to the 
founder of this college. He foresaw, even then, the probable destinies of the 
country. He knew that the dreary forest was not designed forever to incumber 
^he soil. He beheld it yielding to the march of civilization. As he heard the 
crash of the sturdy trunk, falling beneath the narrow ax of the settler ; as he saw 
the log cabins slowly rising on the edge of the clearing, and beheld the smoke 



io8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

liere and there curling up in the lonely and mysterious woods ; as he heard the 
voice of the mountain stream, then babbling unheeded over the rocks, — his 
sagacious mind overleaped the interval of years. He was called, by his intrepid 
spirit and his country's voice, to take an active part in the first scenes of the 
War of 1755. A presentiment of his fate seems to have been upon his mind. 
Before plunging into the campaign, he made provision for the appropriation of 
his fortune to furnish the means of education to the people whose struggles, in 
settling this region, he had witnessed and shared. His will was made at Albany, 
on the 226. of July, 1755, bequeathing his property for the fotmdation of this 
institution ; and, on the 8th of September of the same year, in an engagement 
Avith the troops under the Baron Dieskau, he fell at the head of his regiment. 
Eighty years only have passed away. The laudable purposes of your founder 
have been more than fulfilled ; and out of the living fountain struck open in the 
desert by his generous bequest, abundant streams of piety and learning have 
fiowed and are flowing. 

Colonel Williams's character was of no ordinary mold. At a distance from 
the seat of his benefaction full justice has not been done to his memory. A 
man of the happiest temperament, a gentleman of the true natural stamp, un- 
assuming and simple, supplying the deficiency of a learned education by large 
experience of men and things, acquired in foreign travel, in the Legislature, 
and in the Army, yet modestly lamenting what others did not trace, his want of 
early advantages ; without a family, but the patriarch of the frontier settlement 
where he was stationed, — he fell, in the prime of early manhood, a victim to 
his patriotic zeal. A brief sketch of his biography, in one of the early volumes 
of the Massachusetts Historical Collections, informs us that he witnessed, with 
humane and painful sensations, the dangers, dififlculties, and hardships which 
the settlers of these valleys were obliged to encounter; and that, to encourage 
them, he was accustomed to imitate the purpose which was carried into efifect 
in his will. I regret not to have found Colonel Williams's views on this subject 
preserved somewhat in detail. It would have been exceedingly interesting to 
see the topic of education, in reference to the wants of a newly-settled country, 
as it presented itself to the practical view of a man of his character, on the eve 
of a war. As no such record, as far as I know, has been preserved, you will 
pardon me for attempting to present the subject to you, under the same light 
in which he may have contemplated it. 

" My friends " (we may conceive he would say to a group of settlers, gath- 
ered about old Fort Massachusetts, on some fit occasion, not long before his 
marching toward the place of rendezvous), " your hardships, I am aware, are 
great. I have witnessed, I have shared them. The hardships incident to 



THE EDUCATION OF THE PEOPLE. 109 

opening a new country are always severe. They are heightened, in our case, 
by the constant danger in which we hve from the savage enemy. At present, 
we are rather encamped than settled. We live in blockhouses ; we lie upon our 
arms by night ; and, like the Jews who returned to build Jerusalem, we go to 
work, by day, with the implements of husbandry in one hand and the weapons 
of war in the other. Nor is this the worst. We have been bred up in the 
populous settlements on the coast, where the schoolhouse and the church are 
found at the center of every village. Here, as yet, we can have neither. I know 
these things weigh upon you. You look upon the dark and impenetrable for- 
ests, in which you have made an opening, and contrast it with the pleasant 
villages where you were born and passed your early years, where your parents 
are yet living, or where they have gone to their rest ; and you cannot suppress a 
painful emotion. 

" You are, more especially, as I perceive, somewhat disheartened at the 
present moment of impending war. But, my friends, let not your spirits sink. 
The prospect is overcast, but brighter days will come. In vision I can plainly 
foresee them. The forest disappears ; the cornfield, the pasture, takes its place ; 
the hillsides are spotted with flocks ; the music of the water-wheel sounds in 
accord with the, dashing stream. Your little groups of log cabins swell into 
prosperous villages. Schools and churches spring up in the waste; institutions 
for learning arise ; and in what is now a wild solitude, libraries and cabinets 
unfold their treasures, and observatories point tlieir tubes to the heavens. I 
tell you that not all the united powers of all the French and Indians on the St. 
Lawrence, — no, not if backed by all the powers of darkness which seem, at 
times, in league with them to infest this howling wilderness, — will long pre- 
vent the valleys of the Hoosac and the Housatonic from becoming the abode of 
industry, abundance, and refinement. A century will not pass, before the voice 
of domestic wisdom and fireside inspiration^ from the vales of Berkshire, will 
be heard throughout America and Europe. As for the contest impending, I am 
sure we shall conquer; if I mistake not, it is the first of a series of events of 
unutterable moment to all America, and even to mankind. Before it closes, the 
banner of St. George will float, I am sure, over Cape Diamond ; and the exten- 
sion of the British power over the whole continent will be but the first act of 
a great drama, whose catastrophe I but dimly foresee. 

" I speak of what concerns the whole country ; the fortune of individuals 
is wrapped in the uncertain future. For myself, I must own that I feel a fore- 
boding at my heart which I cannot throw off. I can only say, if my hour is 
come (and I think it is not distant), I am prepared. I have been able to do 



no 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



but little ; but it Providence has no further work for me to perform, I am ready 
to be discharged from the warfare. It is my purpose, before I am taken from 
you, to make a disposition of my property for the benefit of this infant com- 
munity. My heart's desire is that, in the picture of its future prosperity, which 
I behold in mental view, the last and best of earthly blessings shall not be want- 
ing. 1 shall deem my life not spent in vain, though it be cut off to-morrow, if, 
at its close, I shall be accepted as the humble instrument of promoting the great 
cause of education. 

" My friends, as I am soon to join the Army, we meet, many of us, perhaps, 
for the last time. I am a solitary branch ; I can be spared. I have no wife to 
feel my loss ; no children to follow me to the grave. I may fall by the tomahawk, 
or in the front of honorable battle ; on the shores of the stormy lake, or in the 
infested woods ; and this poor body may want even a friendly hand to protect it 
from insult. But I must take the chance of a soldier's life. When I am gone, 
you will find some proof that my last thoughts were with the settlers of Fort 
Massachusetts ; and perhaps, at some future day, should my desire to serve you 
and your children not be disappointed, my humble name will not be forgotten 
in the public assembly, and posterity will bestow a tear on the memory of 
Ephraim Williams." 

(Being part of an address to the Adelphic Union Society of Williams College, August i6, 1837.) 



4.-*- 











NECESSITY OF COMPROMISES IN POLITICS. iii 



Necessity of Compromises in Politics. 

By RUFUS CHOATE, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1799, died 1859.) 

ET me say, sir, that to administer the contested powers of the Constitu- 
tion is, for those of you who beheve that they exist, at all times a trust 
of difficulty and delicacy. I do not know that I should not venture to 
suggest this general direction for the performance of that grave duty. 
Steadily and strongly assert their existence ; do not surrender them ; 
retain them with a provident forecast ; for the time may come when 
you will need to enforce them by the whole moral and physical strength of the 
Union ; but do not exert them at all so long as you can by other less offensive 
expedients of wisdom effectually secure to the people all the practical benefits 
which you believe they were inserted into the Constitution to secure. Thus 
will the Union last longest and do most good. To exercise a contested power 
w ithout necessity on a notion of keeping up the tone of government is not much 
better than tyranny, and very improvident and impolitic tyranny, too. It is 
turning " extreme medicine into daily bread." It forgets that the final end of 
government is not to exert restraint, but to do good. 

Within this general view of the true mode of administering contested 
powers, I think the measure we propose is as wise as it is conciliatory ; wise 
because it is conciliatory ; wise because it reconciles a sound and a strong theory 
of the Constitution with a discreet and kind administration of it. I desire to 
give the country a bank. Well, here is a mode in which I can do it. , Shall I 
refuse to do it in that mode, because I cannot at the same time, and by the 
same operation, gain a victory over the settled constitutional opinions, and show 
my contempt for the ancient and unappeasable jealousy and prejudices of not 
far less than half of the American people ? Shall I refuse to do it in that mode, 
because I cannot at the same time, and by the same operation, win a triumph 
of constitutional law over political associates, who agree with me on nine in 
ten of all the questions which divide the parties of the country ; whose energies 
and eloquence, under many an October and many an August sun, have con- 
tributed so much to the transcendent reformation which has brought you, into 
power? Shall I refuse to the people their riglits, until and unless, by the mode 




I 



RuFus Choate. 



NECESSITY OF COMPROMISES IN POLITICS. 



i^? 



of conferring those rights, I can also plant a wound in the side of one who has 
stood shoulder to shoulder with me in the great civil contest of the last ten 
years? Do you really desire that the same cloud of summer which pauses to 
pour out its treasures, long withheld, on the parched and dreary land, should 
send down a thunderbolt on the head of a noble and conspicuous friend? Cer- 
tainly nobody here can cherish such a thought for a moment. 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, July 2, 1841.) 



!■■' ■>_;SX: 





114 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Valedictory. 

By HENRY CLAY, of Kentucky. 

(Born 1777, died 1852.) 

UT, sir, if I have a difficulty in giving utterance to an expression of the 
feelings of gratitude which fill my heart toward my friends, dispersed 
throughout this continent, what shall I say — what can I say — at all 
commensurate with my feelings of gratitude toward that State whose 
humble servitor I am? I migrated to the State of Kentucky nearly 
forty-five years ago. I went there as an orphan, who had not yet 
attained his majority — who had never recognized a father's smile — poor, penni- 
less, without the favor of the great — with an imperfect and inadequate educa- 
tion, limited to the means applicable to such a boy — but scarcely had I set 
foot upon that generous soil, before I was caressed with parental fondness — 
patronized with bountiful munificence — and I may add to this, that her choicest 
honors, often unsolicited, have been freely showered upon me; and when I 
stood, as it were, in the darkest moments of human existence — abandoned by 
the world, calumniated by a large portion of my own countrymen, she threw 
around me her impenetrable shield, and bore me aloft, and repelled the attacks 
of malignity and calumny, by which I was assailed. Sir, it is to me an unspeak- 
able pleasure that I am shortly to return to her friendly limits ; and that I shall 
finally deposit (and it will not be long before that day arrives) my last remains 
under her generous soil, with the remains of her gallant and patriotic sons who 
have preceded me. * * * 

Yet, sir, during this long period, I have not escaped the fate of other public 
men, in this and other countries. I have been often, Mr. President, the object 
of bitter and unmeasured detraction and calumny. I have borne it, I will not 
say always with composure, but I have borne it without creating any disturb- 
ance. I have borne it waiting in unshaken and undoubting confidence, that the 
triumphs of truth and justice would ultimately prevail ; and that time would settle 
all things as they ought to be settled. I have borne them under the conviction, 
of which no injustice, no wrong, no injury could deprive me, that I did not 
deserve them, and that he to whom we are all to be finally and ultimately re- 
sponsible, would acquit me whatever injustice I might experience at the hands 
of my fellow men. * * * 



VALEDICTORY. 



115 



Mr. President, a recent epithet (I do not know whether for the purpose of 
honor or of degradation) has been applied to me ; and I have been held up to 
the country as a dictator! Dictator! The idea of dictatorship is drawn from 
Rortian institutions ; and there, when it was created, the person who was in- 
vested with this tremendous authority, concentrated in his own person the whole 
power of the State. He exercised unlimited control over the property and lives 
of the citizens of the commonwealth. He had the power of raising armies, and 
of raising revenue by taxing the people. If I have been a dictator, what have 
been the powers with which I have been clothed? Have I possessed an army, a 
navy, revenue? Have I had the distribution of the patronage of the Govern- 
ment? Have I, in short, possessed any power whatever? Sir, if I have been a 
dictator, I think those who apply the epithet to me must at least admit two 
things : in the first place, that my dictatorship has been distinguished by no 
cruel executions, stained by no deeds of blood, soiled by no act of dishonor. 
And they must no less acknowledge, in the second place (though I do not know 
when its commencement bears date, but I suppose, however, that it is intended 
to be averred, from the commencement of the extra session), that if I have been 
invested with, or have usurped the dictatorship, I have at least voluntarily sur- 
rendered the power within a shorter period than was assigned by the Roman 
laws for its continuance. 

(From the farewell address delivered in the United States Senate in 1842.) 




ii6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




General Jackson's Fine. 

By SILAS WRIGHT, of New York. 

(Born 1795, died 1847.) 



HAT wov:ld be the fair inferences from the passage of the measure in its 
present form? That his every act upon that momentous occasion 
was within the strict letter and rule of the law? No, sir, no. Do the 
political friends of General Jackson ask you to say that? Not at all; 
and I believe in my heart that every member of the Senate will be 
his friend as to the passage of this bill, and will cheerfully say all 
which the bill calls upon them to say, if they will divest themselves of political 
prejudices, and look at the proposition as it is. It is conceded by all that 
General Jackson, upon the occasion referred to, acted precisely as, under the cir- 
cumstances which surrounded him, he should have acted — precisely as the 
protection of the city of New Orleans and that important portion of the Union 
required he should act ; and that he deserves, for his conduct in that memorable 
defense, the thanks and gratitude and approbation of his country. This con- 
cession is all the expression called for by the bill, by the friends of General 
Jackson, or by the General himself. 

Yet, we are told that this is not the mode in which the approbation of the 
country should be manifested toward this distinguished officer, for his unex- 
ampled firmness and gallantry and success upon this great and glorious occa- 
sion ; that we should pass a resolution presenting to him our thanks ! Thanks, 
sir? The thanks of Congress were presented to him by the warm and cheerful 
hearts of those who occupied our places when his unparalleled services were 
better esteemed than they seem to be now — of those who were contempo- 
raneous with the transactions, and upon whom was reflected the sweeping and 
resistless torrent of a nation's gratitude and admiration. Thanks from us? 
They would come cold and dead, after the manifestations of feeling which the 
defense of New Orleans drew fresh and warm from every heart in the country, 
as the news of the glorious victory of the 8th of January, 181 5, spread itself 
over our broad land. 




Silas Wright. 



3i8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Is it desired to do justice to the fame of General Jackson, as to the penalty 
imposed upon him by Judge Hall? Pass a resolution, says the honorable 
Senator from Louisiana (Mr. Conrad), directing a painting to represent the 
scene — the judge in his robes, and the victorious general bowing himself before 
the majesty of the law, and submitting, without resistance, to the penalty and 
punishment inflicted upon him for having taken the measure of precaution and 
security necessary to enable him to win the laurels which adorned the elevated 
prisoner. Hang that picture in a niche of the rotunda of the Capitol, and thus 
make the General and his acts immortal. 

Sir, such a picture would be a proud one for the country, and especially 
for that distinguished general ; and I should rejoice to see it gracing the Capitol 
of the nation. But will you write beneath it, " We gained a thousand dollars to 
the public treasury by this operation, which has paid for this picture?" Will 
you hang the proud national emblem aloft in this marble palace, and invoke 
toward it the attention and admiration of all succeeding ages ; and, in the very 
moment when you do so, make up a record upon your journal here, which must 
either disgrace the General, whose gallant services and patriotic forbearance 
gave the sketch for the painting, or must disgrace the country he so faithfully 
and disinterestedly served? The General, by his wisdom and valor, defended, 
with a handful of undisciplined militia, one of your proudest cities against a 
veteran enemy of many times his numbers. In doing so, he had, in the opinion 
of a judge and a lawyer, committed a technical breach of the law, and been 
guilty of a technical contempt of court. He was arraigned by the precise judge 
for his offense, and within the very bounds of his military camp, in the hour 
of his proud victory, and in the presence of his gallant companions in arms, 
and of thousands of his indignant countrymen, he unresistingly permitted him- 
self to be led to the bar of the court as a criminal, and there received the sen- 
tence of the law, and paid this one thousand dollars as the penalty of the offense 
charged against him ; not a human being then, as since, questioning the purity 
of his intentions, or the wisdom of his acts. This is the event, it is said, we 
should commemorate by a national painting ; and yet we are urged to refuse to 
refund the penalty thus incurred in our service ; or, if we do refund it, to say, as 
part of the act, that it was worthily imposed. Will we, can we, do this? No, 
sir, no. The heart of every man who occupies a seat here will tell him that he 
cannot do it ; that he cannot vote for such a memorial to national honor and 
private merit, and place his vote at the foot of such a record. 

Of what use would be such a painting? The transactions alluded to are 
painted upon the heart of every American citizen, in living colors, with a pencil 
more true, in figures more full and animated, and by impressions more indelible, 



I 



GENERAL JACKSON'S FINE. 



119 



than art can produce. All that those pictures require is, that you rub from them 
the stain of this unmerited penalty ; and that, they do not entreat, but demand 
at our hands. He did not say illegal penalty, but unjust and unmerited penalty. 
The bill did not say either illegal, or unjust, or unmerited penalty, in language; 
but its passage will say a penalty which his country, and not its faithful officer, 
should bear. He incurred it by the performance of acts necessary for the de- 
fense of that country, at a period of imminent peril; and the simple repayment 
O'f the money, in the manner proposed by the bill, will say to him, and to all 
who may come after him, and be charged with their country's defense in time of 
war, that if the performance of their responsible duties shall bring upon them 
legal penalties, neither their private fortunes nor their hard-earned reputations 
shall suffer in consequence ; but that such penalties shall be upon the country 
they faithfully serve, not upon its faithful servants. 

Does this bill, in its present form, propose to say more than this ? Not one 
word. It does not say that the law was not technically violated ; that the pen- 
alty was not legally imposed ; or that the judge was not honest in his pro- 
ceedings — but simply that the General acted as, in his conscience, he believed 
it was his duty to act; that he acted wisely for the object he had in view — the 
defense of an important and exposed section of the country against a powerful 
invading enemy ; and that any penalties incurred by him, in the proper dis- 
charge of that responsible service, should be paid by the public treasury, and 
not by himself. Are not all ready to say this much in reference to transactions 
upon which the judgment of the country has been distinctly known, and known 
to be entirely favorable to the General, for a period of almost thirty years ? Shall 
we not, then, pass this bill in its original form ; and thus simply pay back this 
money and the interest, and avoid all these technical questions, upon which no 
Senator, as a mere lawyer, may desire now to pass ? 

(Being part of the speech delivered in the United States Senate, May 18, 1842.) 





120 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Chinese Mission. 

By THOMAS H. BENTON, of North Carolina. 

(Born 1782, died 1858.) 



HAT there is no necessity for a treaty with China is proved by the fact 
that our trade with that country has been going on well without one 
for a century or two, and is now growing and increasing constantly. 
It is a trade conducted on the simple and elementary principle of 
" here is one " and " there is the other " — all ready-money, and hard 
money, or good products — no credit system, no paper money. For a 
long time this trade took nothing but silver dollars. At present it is taking 
some other articles, and especially a goodly quantity of Missouri lead. This 
has taken place without a treaty, and without an agent at forty thousand dollars 
expense. All things are going on well between us and the Chinese. Our rela- 
tions are purely commercial, conducted on the simplest principles of trade, and 
unconnected with political views. China has no political connection with us. 
She is not within the system, or circle, of American policy. She can have no 
designs upon us, or views in relation to us ; and we have no need of a Minister 
to watch and observe her conduct. Politically and commercially the mission is 
useless. By the Constitution, all the Ministers are to be appointed by the 
Senate ; but this Minister to China is to be called an agent, and sent out by the 
President without the consent of the Senate ; and thus, by imposing a false name 
upon the Minister, defraud the Senate of their control over the appointment. 
The enormity of the sum shows that the mission is to be more expensive than 
any one ever sent from the United States; and that it is to be one of the first 
grade, or of a higher grade than any known in our country. Nine thousand 
dollars per annum, and the same for an outfit, is the highest compensation 
known to our service ; yet this forty thousand dollar mission may double that 
amount, and still the Minister be only called an agent, for the purpose of cheat- 
ing the Senate out of its control over the appointment. The bill is fraudulent 
in relation to the compensation to be given to this ambassadorial agent. No 
sum is fixed, but he is to take what he pleases for himself and his suite. He 
and they are to help themselves ; and, from the amount allowed, they may help 




Thomas H. Benton. 



122 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

themselves liberally. In all other cases, salaries and compensations are fixed 
by law, and graduated by time ; here there is no limit of either money or time. 
This mission goes by the job — forty thousand dollars for the job — without 
regard to time or cost. A summer's work or a year's work, it is all the same 
thing : it is a job, and is evidently intended to enable a gentleman, who loves to 
travel in Europe and Asia, to extend his travels to the Celestial Empire at the 
expense of the United States, and to write a book. The settlement of the 
accounts is a fraud upon the treasury. In all cases of foreign missions, except 
where secret services are to be performed, and spies and informers to be dealt 
with, the accounts are settled at the Treasury Department, by the proper ac- 
counting officers ; when secret services are to be covered, the fund out of which 
they are paid is then called the contingent foreign intercourse fund ; and are 
settled at the State Department, upon a simple certificate from the President, 
that the money has been applied according to its intention. It was in this way 
that the notorious John Henry obtained his fifty thousand dollars during the late 
war; and that various other sums have been paid out to secret agents at different 
times. To this I do not object. Every government, in its foreign intercourse, 
must have recourse to agents, and have the benefit of some services, which would 
be defeated if made public ; and which must, therefore, be veiled in secrecy, and 
paid for privately. This must happen in all governments ; but not so in this 
case of the Chinese mission. Here, secrecy is intended for what our own 
Minister, his secretary, and his whole suite, are to receive. Not only what they 
may give in bribes to Chinese, but what they take in pay to themselves, is to be 
a secret. All is secret and irresponsible ! And it will not do to assimilate this 
mission to the oldest government in the world, to'the anomalous and anonymous 
missions to revolutionary countries. Such an analogy has been attempted in 
defense of this mission, and South American examples cited ; but the cases are 
not analogous. Informal agencies, with secret objects, are proper to revolution- 
ary governments ; but here is to be a public mission, and an imposing one — the 
grandest ever sent out from the United States. To attempt to assimilate such a 
m.ission to a John Henry case, or to a South American agency, is absurd and 
impudent ; and is a fraud upon the system of accountability to which all our 
missions are subjected. 

The sum proposed is the same that is in the act of 1790, upon which the 
bill is framed. That act appropriated forty thousand dollars; but for what? 
For one mission? One man? One agent? One by himself, alone? No. 
Not at all. That appropriation of 1790 was for all the missions of the year — 
of every kind — public as well as secret ; the forty thousand dollars in this bill 
is for one man. The whole diplomatic appropriation in the time of Washington 



CHINESE MISSION. 



123 



is now to be given to one man ; and it is known pretty well who it is to be. 
Forty thousand dollars to enable one of our citizens to get to Pekin and to 
bump his head nineteen times on the ground, to get the privilege of standing 
up in the presence of his majesty of the Celestial Empire. And this is our work 
in the last night of this Congress. It is now midnight ; and, like the midnight 
which preceded the departure of the elder Adams from the Government, the 
whole time is spent in making and filling offices. Providing for favorites ana 
feeding out of the public crib is the only work to those whose brief reign is 
drawing to a close, and who have been already compelled by public sentiment 
to undo a part of their work. The bankrupt act is repealed by the Congress 
that made it ; the distribution act has shared the same fate ; and if they had 
another session to sit, the mandanms act against the States, the habeas corpus 
against the States, this Chinese mission, and all the other acts would be undone. 
It would be the true realization of the story of the queen who unraveled at night 
the web that she wove during the day. As it is, enough has been done, and 
undone, to characterize this Congress — to entitle it to the name of Ulysses' wife 
— not because (like the virtuous Penelope) it resisted seduction, — but because, 
like her, its own hands unraveled its own work. 

(Being part of a speech delivered in the United States Senate in 1843.) 





124 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Annexation of Texas. 

By THOMAS H. BENTON, of North Carolina. 

(Bom 1782, (Tied 1858.) 



*HE President (Tyler), upon our call, sends us a map and a memoir from 
the topographical bureau to show the Senate the boundaries of the 
country he proposes to annex. This memoir is explicit in presenting 
the Rio Grande del Norte in its whole extent as a boundary of the 
Republic of Texas, and that in conformity to the law of the Texan 
Congress establishing its boundaries. The boundaries on the map 
conform to those in the memoir ; each takes for the western limit the Rio Grande 
from head to mouth; and a law of the Texan Congress is copied into the 
margin of the map, to show the legal, and the actual, boundaries at the same 
time. From all this it results that the treaty before us, besides the incorpora- 
tion of Texas proper, also incorporates into our Union the left bank of the Rio 
Grande, in its whole extent from its head spring in the Sierra Verde (Green 
Mountain), near the South Pass in the Rocky Mountains, to its mouth in the 
Gulf of Mexico, four degrees south of New Orleans, in latitude 26°. It is a 
" grand and solitary river," almost without afifluents or tributaries. Its source is 
in the region of eternal snow ; its outlet in the clime of eternal flowers. Its 
direct course is twelve hundred miles ; its actual run about two thou- 
sand miles. This immense river, second on our continent to the 
Mississippi only, and but little inferior to it in length, is proposed 
to be added in the whole extent of its left bank to the American 
Union ; and that by virtue of a treaty for the reannexation of Texas. 
Now, the real Texas which we acquired by the treaty of 1803, and flung away 
by the treaty of 1819, never approached the Rio Grande except near its mouth; 
while the whole upper part was settled by the Spaniards, and a great part of it 
in the year 1694 — just one hundred years before La Salle first saw Texas. 
All this upper part was then formed into provinces, on both sides of the river, 
and has remained under Spanish, or Mexican authority ever since. These 
former provinces of the Mexican viceroyalty, now departments of the Mexican 
Republic, lying on both sides of the Rio Grande from its head to its mouth, 
we now propose to incorporate, so far as they lie on the left bank of the river, 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 125 

into our Union, by virtue of a treaty of reannexation with Texas. Let us pause 
and look at our new and important proposed acquisitions in this quarter. 
First : there is the department, formerly the province of New Mexico, lying on 
both sides of the river from its head spring to near the Paso del Norte — that 
is to say, half down the river. This department is studded with towns and 
villages — is populated — well cultivated — and covered with flocks and herds. 
On its left bank (for I only speak of the part which we propose to reannex) is, 
first, the frontier village Taos, three thousand souls, and where the custom- 
house is kept at which the Missouri caravans enter their goods. Then 
comes Santa Fe, the capital, four thousand souls ; then Albuquerque, six 
thousand souls ; then some scores of other towns and villages, all more 
or less populated, and surrounded by flocks and fields. Then come 
the departments of Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas, without settle- 
ments on the left bank of the river, but occupying the right bank, 
and commanding the left. All this — being parts of four Mexican departments 
— now under Mexican Governors and Governments, is permanently reannexed 
to this Union, if this treaty is ratified ; and is actually reannexed from the 
moment of the signature of the treaty, according to the President's last mes- 
sage, to remain so until the acquisition is rejected by rejecting the treaty. The 
one-half of the department of New Mexico, with its capital, becomes a Territory 
of the United States ; an angle of Chihuahua, at the Paso del Norte, famous for 
its wine, also becomes ours ; a part of the department of Coahuila, not populated 
on the left bank, which we take, but commanded from the right bank by 
Mexican authorities ; the same of Tamaulipas, the ancient Nuevo San Tander 
(New St. Andrew), and which covers both sides of the river from its mouth for 
some hundred miles up, and all the left bank of which is in the power and 
possession of Mexico. These, in addition to the old Texas, these parts of four 
States, these towns and villages, these people and territory, these flocks and 
herds, this slice of the Republic of Mexico, two thousand miles long, and some 
hundred broad, all this our President has cut off from its mother empire, and 
presents to us, and declares it is ours till the Senate rejects it. He calls it Texas ; 
and the cutting ofif he _ calls reannexation. Humboldt calls it New Mexico, 
Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Nuevo San Tander (now Tamaulipas) ; and the civil- 
ized world may qualify this reannexation by the application of some odious and 
terrible epithet. Demosthenes advised the people of Athens not to take, but 
to retake a certain city ; and in that re laid the virtue which saved the act from 
the character of spoliation and robbery. Will it be equally potent with us? and 
will the re prefixed to the annexation, legitimate the seizure of two thousand 
miles of a neighbor's dominion, with whom we have treaties of peace, and 



126 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

friendship, and commerce? Will it legitimate this seizure, made by virtue of a 
treaty with Texas, when no Texan force — witness the disastrous expeditions 
to Mier and to Santa Fe — have been seen near it without being killed or taken, 
to the last man? 

The treaty, in all that relates to the boundary of the Rio Grande, is an act 
of unparalleled outrage on Mexico. It is the seizure of two thousand miles of 
her territory without a word of explanation with her, and by virtue of a treaty 
with Texas, to which she is no party. Our Secretary of State (Mr. Calhoun), in 
his letter to the United States Charge in Mexico, and seven days after the treaty 
was signed, and after the Mexican Minister had withdrawn from our seat of 
government, shows full well that he was conscious of the enormity of the out- 
rage, knew it was war, and proffered volunteer apologies to avert the conse- 
quences which he knew he had provoked. 

The President, in his special message of Wednesday last, informs us that we 
have acquired a title to the ceded territories by his signature to the treaty, 
wanting only the action of the Senate to perfect it ; and that, in the meantime, 
he will protect it from invasion, and for that purpose has detached all the dis- 
posable portions of the Army and Navy to the scene of action. This is a caper 
about equal to the mad freaks with which the unfortunate Emperor Paul, of 
Russia, was accustomed to astonish Europe about forty years ago. By this 
declaration the thirty thousand Mexicans in the left half of the valley of the 
Rio del Norte are our citizens, and standing, in the language of the President's 
message, in a hostile attitude toward us, and subject to be repelled as invaders. 
Taos, the seat of the custom-house, where our caravans enter their goods, is 
ours ; Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico, is ours ; Governor Armijo is our 
Governor, and subject to be tried for treason if he does not submit to us ; twenty 
Mexican towns and villages are ours ; and their peaceful inhabitants, cultivating 
their fields and tending their flocks, are suddenly converted, by a stroke of the 
President's pen, into American citizens, or American rebels. This is too bad ; 
and, instead of making themselves party to its enormities, as the President in- 
vites them to do, I think rather that it is the duty of the Senate to wash its 
hands of all this part of the transaction by a special disapprobation. The Senate 
is the constitutional adviser of the President, and has the right, if not the duty, 
to give him advice when the occasion requires it. I, therefore, propose, as an 
additional resolution, applicable to the Rio del Norte boundary only — the one 
v/hich I will read and send to the secretary's table — stamping as a spoliation 
this seizure of Mexican territory, and on which, at the proper time, I shall ask 
the vote of the Senate. 

(Being part of the speech delivered in the United States Senate in 1844.) 




THE MEXICAN WAR. 127 



The Mexican War. 

By THOMAS CORWIN, of Ohio. 

(Born 1794, died 1865.) 



"HAT is the territory, Mr. President, which you propose to wrest from 
Mexico? It is consecrated to the heart of the Mexican by many a 
well-fought battle, with his old Castilian master. His Bunker Hills, 
and Saratogas, and Yorktowns are there. The Mexican can say, 
" There I bled for liberty ! and shall I surrender that consecrated home 
of my affections to the Anglo-Saxon invaders ? What do they want 
with it? They have Texas already. They have possessed themselves of the 
territory between the Nueces and the Rio Grande. What else do they want? 
To what shall I point my children as memorials of that independence which I 
bequeath to them, when those battlefields shall have passed from my pos- 
session? " 

Sir, had one come and demanded Bunker Hill of the people of Massachu- 
setts, had England's lion ever showed himself there, is there a man over thirteen, 
and under ninety, who would not have been ready to meet him — is there a river 
on this continent that would not have run red with blood — is there a field but 
would have been piled high with the unburied bones of slaughtered Americans 
before these consecrated battlefields of liberty should have been wrested from us ? 
But this same American goes into a sister republic, and says to poor, weak 
Mexico, "Give up your territory — you are unworthy to possess it — I have 
got one-half already — all I ask you is to give up the other ! " England might 
as well, in the circumstances I have described, have come and demanded of us 
" Give up the Atlantic slope — give up this trifling territory from the Allegheny 
mountains to the sea ; it is only from Maine to St. Mary's — only about one- 
third of your Republic, and the least interesting portion of it." What would 
be the response? They would say, "We must give this up to John Bull." 
Why? "He wants room." The Senator from Michigan says he must have 
this. Why, my worthy Christian brother, on what principle of justice? " I 
want room ! " 



128 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Sir, look at this pretense of want of room. With twenty miUions of people, 
you have about one thousand millions of acres of land, inviting settlement by 
every conceivable argument — bringing them down to a quarter of a dollar a.n 
acre, and allowing every man to squat where he pleases. But the Senator from 
Michigan says we will be two hundred millions in a few years, and we want 
room. If I were a Mexican I would tell you, " Have you not room in your 
own country to bury your dead men ? If you come into mine we will greet you 
with bloody hands, and welcome you to hospitable graves." 

Why, says the chairman of this Committee of Foreign Relations, it is the 
most reasonable thing in the world! We ought to have the Bay of San Francisco. 
Why? Because it is the best harbor on the Pacific! It has been my fortune, 
Mr. President, to have practiced a good deal in criminal courts in the course of 
my life, but I never yet heard a thief, arraigned for stealing a horse, plead that 
it was the best horse that he could find in the country ! We want California. 
What for? "Why," says the Senator from Michigan, "we will have it;" and 
the Senator from South Carolina, with a very mistaken view, I think, of policy, 
says, " You can't keep our people from going there." I don't desire to prevent 
them. Let them go and seek their happiness in whatever country or clime it 
pleases them. 

All I ask of them is, not to require this Government to protect them with 
that banner consecrated to war waged for principles — eternal, enduring truth. 
Sir, it is not meet- that our old flag should throw its protecting folds over ex- 
peditions for lucre or for land. But you still say, you want room for your 
people. This has been the plea of every robber-chief from Nimrod to the 
present hour. I dare say, when Tamerlane descended from his throne built of 
seventy thousand human skulls, and marched his ferocious battalions to further 
slaughter, I dare say he said, " I want room." Bajazet was another gentleman 
of kindred tastes and wants with us Anglo-Saxons — he " wanted room." Alex- 
ander, too, the mighty " Macedonian madman," when he wandered with his 
Greeks to the plains of India, and fought a bloody battle on the very ground 
where recently England and the Sikhs engaged in strife for " room," was, no 
doubt, in quest of some California there. Many a Monterey had he to storm 
to get " room." Sir, he made quite as much of that sort of history as you ever 
will. Mr. President, do you remember the last chapter in that history? It is 
soon read. Oh ! I wish we could but understand its moral. Ammon's son 
(so was Alexander named), after all his victories, died drunk in Babylon! The 
vast empire he conquered to " get room " became the prey of the generals he 
had trained; it was disparted, torn to pieces, and so ended. Sir, there is a very 
significant appendix; it is this: the descendants of the Greeks — of Alexander's 




Thomas Corwin. 



130 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Greeks — are now governed by a descendant of Attila ! Mr. President, while 
we are fighting for room, let us ponder deeply this appendix. I was somewhat 
amazed, the other day, to hear the Senator from Michigan declare that Europe 
had quite forgotten us till these battles waked them up. I suppose the Senator 
feels grateful to the President for " waking up " Europe. Does the President, 
who is, I hope, read in civic as well as military lore, remember the saying of 
one who had pondered upon history long — long, too, upon man, his nature 
and true destiny? Montesquieu did not think highly of this way of "waking 
up." " Happy," says he, " is that nation whose annals are tiresome." 

The Senator from Michigan has a different view of this. He thinks that a 
nation is not distinguished until it is distinguished in war ; he fears that the 
slumbering faculties of Europe have not been able to ascertain that there are 
twenty millions of Anglo-Saxons here, making railroads and canals, and speed- 
ing all the arts of peace to the utmost accomplishment of the most refined 
civilization. They do not know it ! And what is the wonderful expedient which 
this democratic method of making history v.-ould adopt in order to make us 
known? Storming cities, desolating peaceful, happy homes, shooting men — 
aye, sir, such is war — and shooting vv'omen, too ! 

Sir, I have read, in some account of your battle of Monterery, of a lovely 
Mexican girl, who, with the benevolence of an angel in her bosom, and the 
robust courage of a hero in her heart, was busily engaged, during the bloody 
conflict, amid the crash of falling houses, the groans of the dying, and the wild 
shriek of battle, in carrying water to slake the burning thirst of the wounded of 
either host. While bending over a wounded American soldier, a cannon ball 
struck her and blew her to atoms ! Sir, I do not charge my brave, generous- 
liearted countrymen who fought that fight with this. No, no ! We who send 
them — we who know that scenes like this, which might send tears of sorrow 
"down Pluto's iron cheek," are the invariable, inevitable attendants on war — 
we are accountable for this. And this ■ — • this is the way we are to be made 
known to Europe. This — this is to be the vmdying renown of free, republican 
America ! " She has stormed a city — killed many of its inhabitants of both 
sexes — she has room!" So it will read. Sir, if this were our only history, 
then may God of his mercy grant that its volume may speedily come to a close. 

Why is it, sir, that we of the United States, a people of yesterday, compared 
with the older nations of the world, should be waging war for territory — for 
" room ? " Look at your country, extending from the Allegheny mountains to 
the Pacific ocean, capable itself of sustaining, in comfort, a larger population 
than will be in the whole Union for one hundred years to come. Over this 
A'ast expanse of territory, your population is now so sparse that I believe we 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 131 

provided, at the last session, a regiment of mounted men to guard the mail, from 
the frontier of Missouri to the mouth of the Columbia; and yet you persist in 
the ridiculous assertion, " I want room." One would imagine, from the fre- 
quent reiteration of the complaint, that you had a bursting, teeming population, 
whose energy was paralyzed, whose enterprise was crushed, for want of space. 
Why should we be so weak or wicked as to offer this idle apology for ravaging 
a neighboring republic? It will impose on no one at home or abroad. 

Do we not know, Mr. President, that it is a law never to be repealed, that 
falsehood shall be short-lived? Was it not ordained of old that truth only 
shall abide forever? Whatever we may say to-day, or whatever we may write 
in our books, the stern tribunal of history will review it all, detect falsehood, 
and bring us to judgment before that posterity which shall bless or curse us, as 
we may act now, wisely or otherwise. We may hide in the grave (which awaits 
us all), in vain; we may hope there, like the foolish bird that hides its head in 
the sand, in the vain belief that its body is not seen, yet even there, this pre- 
posterous excuse of want of " room," shall be laid bare, and the quick-coming 
future will decide that it was a hypocritical pretense, under which we sought to 
conceal the avarice, which prompted us to covet and to seize by force that which 
was not ours. 

Mr. President, this uneasy desire to augment our territory has depraved the 
moral sense, and blunted the otherwise keen sagacity of our people. What has 
been the fate of all nations who have acted upon the idea that they must ad- 
vance? Our young orators cherish this notion with a fervid, but fatally mis- 
taken zeal. They call it by the mysterious name of " destiny." " Our destiny," 
they say, is " onward," and hence they argue, with ready sophistry, the pro- 
priety of seizing upon any territory and any people that may lie in the way of 
our " fated " advance. Recently, these progressives have grown classical ; some 
assiduous student of antiquities has helped them to a patron saint. They have 
wandered back into the desolated Pantheon, and there, among the Polytheistic 
relics of that " pale mother of dead empires," they have found a god whom these 
Romans, centuries gone by, baptized " Terminus." 

(Delivered in the House of Representatives, February ii, 1847.) 




132 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Foreign Intervention. 

By JOHN A. DIX, of New York. 

(Born 1798, died 1879.) 



ENATORS are doubtless aware that the right of intervention in the af- 
fairs of this continent was formally asserted in the French Chamber of 
Deputies, in the year 1845, by M. Guizot, Minister of Foreign Afifairs, 
as the organ of the Government of France. He regarded the great 
powers on this continent as divided into three groups, namely: Great 
Britain, the United States, and the States of Spanish origin ; and he 
declared that it belonged to France " to protect, by the authority of her name, 
the independence of States, and the equilibrium of the great political forces in 
America." * * * 

Am I in error in supposing this subject derives new importance from our 
existing relations with Mexico, one of the States of Spanish origin, which 
M. Guizot grouped together as constituting one of the great political forces of 
this continent, among which the "equilibrium" was to be maintained? Sir, 
more than once, in the progress of the war, the governments of Europe have 
been invoked, by leading organs of public opinion abroad, to interpose between 
us and Mexico. Is it not, then, appropriate briefly to state what this right of 
intervention is, as it has been asserted in Europe, what it has been in practice, 
and what it would be likely to become, if applied to the States of this continent? 
I trust it will be so considered. * * * 

If we look into the writers on international law, I think we shall find no 
sufBcient ground for the right of intervention. Grotius, who wrote in the early 
part of the seventeenth century, denied its existence. Fenelon, who wrote about 
half a century later, denied it, except as a means of self-preservation, and then 
only when the danger was real and imminent. Vattel, who wrote nearly a 
century after Fenelon, and a century before our own times, regarded the States 
of Europe as forming a political system, and he restricted the right of entering 
into confederacies and alliances for the purpose of intervention in the affairs of 
each other, to cases in which such combinations were necessary to curb the 
ambition of any power which, from its superiority in physical strength, and its 




John A. Dix. 



134 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

designs of oppression or conquest, threatened to become dangerous to its 
neighbors. De Martens, who wrote half a century ago, acknowledges, with 
Vattel, the existence of the right under certain conditions, though he hardly 
admits it to be v/ell settled as a rule of international law ; and he limits its exer- 
cise to neighboring States, or States occupying the same quarter of the globe. 
* * * 

I am confident, Mr. President, that no one can rise from a review of the 
history of modern Europe, and from an examination of the writings of her 
public jurists, without being satisfied that the right of intervention, as recog- 
nized by civilized nations, is what I have stated it to be — a mere right, on the 
part of weaker States, to combine for the purpose of preventing the subversion 
of their independence, and the alienation of their territories, by a designing and 
powerful neighbor ; a right to be exercised only in cases of urgent and immediate 
danger. It is simply a right of self-preservation, undefined, undefinable, having 
no settled or permanent foundation in public law, to be asserted only in ex- 
treme necessity, and when arlntrarily applied to practice, a most fruitful source 
of abuse, injustice, and oppression. One clear and certain limitation it happily 
possesses — a limitation which, amid all its encroachments upon the independ- 
ence of sovereign States, has never until our day been overpassed. By universal 
consent, by the unvarying testimony of abuse itself, it is not to be exercised 
beyond the immediate sphere of the nations concerned. It pertains rigidly and 
exclusively to States within the same circle of political action. 

It is only by neighbors, for the protection of neighbors against neighbors, 
that it can, even upon the broadest principles, be rightfully employed. When 
it traverses oceans, and looks to the regulation of the political concerns of other 
continents, it becomes a gigantic assumption, which, for the independence of 
nations, for the interests of humanity, for the tranquillity of the Old World and 
the New, should be significantly repelled. 

Mr. President, a review of the history of Europe during the last two cen- 
turies will bring with it another conviction in respect to right of intervention — 
that no reliance can be placed on its restriction in practice to the objects to 
which it is limited by every public jurist who admits its existence at all; and 
that nothing could be so discouraging to the friends of free government as an 
extension of the system to this continent, if the power existed to introduce it 
here. * * * 

From a mere right to combine for self-preservation, they have made it in 
practice a right to divide, dismember, and partition States at their pleasure — 
not for the purpose of diminishing the strength of a powerful adversary — but 



FOREIGN INTERVENTION. 135 

under the pretense of creating- a system of balances, which is artificial in its 
structure, and, in some degree, incongruous in its elements, and which a single 
political convulsion may overturn and destroy. Do we need examples of the 
abuse of the power, I will not call it a right? They will be found in the dis- 
memberment of Saxony, the annexation of the Republic of Genoa to the King- 
dom of Sardinia, and the absorption of Venice by Austria. There is another and 
a more aggravated case of abuse to which recent events have given new promi- 
nence. In 1772, Russia, Prussia and Austria, under the pretense that the dis- 
turbed condition of Poland was dangerous to their own tranquillity, seized upon 
about one-third of her territories, and divided it among themselves. In 1793, 
notwithstanding her diminished proportions, she had become more dangerous, 
and they seized half of what they had left to her by the first partition. Sir, she 
continued to grow dangerous as she grew weak ; and in two years after the 
second partition, they stripped her of all that remained. In 181 5, the five great 
powers, at the Congress of Vienna, from motives of policy, and not from a 
returning sense of justice, organized the city of Cracow and a portion of the sur- 
rounding territory, with a population of about one hundred thousand souls, into 
a republic, under the protection of Austria, Russia, and Prussia, with a guarantee 
of its independence in perpetuity. Russia pledged herself, at the same time, to 
maintain her share of the spoil, as the Kingdom of Poland in name and form, with 
a constitutional government. She kept her pledge seventeen years, and then 
virtually incorporated it as an integral part into the Russian Empire. The little 
Republic of Cracow was all that remained as a monument of the dismembered 
kingdom. A year ago it was obliterated as an independent State by the three 
great powers^ eastern and northern Europe, in violation of their solemn 
guarantee, and assigned to Austria. The name of Poland, the fountain of so 
many noble^ and animating recollections, is no longer to be found on the map 
ofEurope. The three-quarters of a century which intervened from the inception 
to the consummation of this transaction are not sufificient to conceal or even 
to obscure its true character. The very magnitude of the space over which it is 
spread only serves to bring it out in bolder and darker relief from the pages 
of history. 

If the United States, in the progress of these usurpations, has not remon- 
strated against them, and contributed by her interposition to maintain the integ- 
rity of the States thus disorganized and dismembered in violation of every rule 
of right, and every suggestion of justice and humanity, it is because we have 
been faithful, against all movements of sympathy, against the very instincts of 
nature, to the principle of abstaining from all interference with the movements 



136 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of European powers, which relate exclusively to the condition of the quarter 
of the globe to which they belong. * * * 

Mr. President, the declaration of M. Guizot could hardly have been made 
without the previous approbation of the Government, of which he was the organ. 
The same sovereign occupies the throne of France — the same Minister stands 
before it as the exponent of his opinions. Is the declaration to be regarded as 
a mere idle annunciation in words of a design never intended to be carried into 
practice? Let me answer the question by the briefest possible reference to cir- 
cumstances. France was the coadjutor of England in the attempt to induce 
Texas to decline annexation to the L^nion. Failing in this, she attempted to 
accomplish the same object indirectly, by persuading IMexico to recognize the 
independence of Texas, on condition that the latter should remain an independ- 
ent State. These terms were offered to Texas, and rejected. In the year 1844, 
I believe less than twelve months before Mr. Guizot's declaration was made 
(and the coincidence in point of time is remarkable), a book on Oregon and 
California was published in Paris by order of the King of France, under the 
auspices of Marshal Soult, President of the Council, and M. Guizot. Minister 
of Foreign Affairs, and written by AI. de Mofras, who was attached to the 
French legation in Mexico. The first part of the work is devoted to Mexico, 
and certainly contains some remarkable passages. He speaks of the establish- 
ment of a European monarchy as a project which has been suggested as the 
only one calculated to put an end to the divisions and annihilate the factions 
which desolated that beautiful country. He says the Catholic religion and 
family relations, with the ancient possessors of the country, would be the first 
conditions required of the princes, who should be called to reconstruct there a 
monarchical government. He then adds : 

" The infantas of Spain, the French princes, and the archdukes of Austria, 
fulfill these conditions, and we may affirm that, from whichever quarter a com- 
petitor should present himself, he would be unanimously welcomed by the 
Mexican people. 

"What, then, are the interests of France in these questions? 

" The establishment in Mexico of a monarchy of any description whatever, 
resting upon a solid basis, should be the first object of our policy ; for we know 
that the instability attached to the actual form of its Government, brings with it 
disadvantages for our commerce, and inconveniences for our people." * * * 

Mr. President, any attempt by a European power to interpose in the af- 
fairs of Mexico, either to establish a monarchy, or to maintain, in the language 
of M. Guizot, " the equilibrium of the great political forces of America," would 



FOREIGN INTERVENTION. 



137 



be the signal for a war far more important in its consequences, and inscrutable 
in its issues, than this. We could not submit to such interposition if we would. 
The public opinion of the country would compel us to resist it. We are com- 
mitted by the most formal declarations, first made by President Monroe in 1823, 
and repeated by the present Chief Magistrate of the Union. We have protested, 
in the most solemn manner, against any further colonization by European 
powers on this continent. We have protested against any interference in the 
political concerns of the independent States in this hemisphere. A protest, it 
is true, does not imply that the ground it assumes is to be maintained at all 
hazards, and, if necessary, by force of arms. * * * 

The declarations of a President having no power to make war without a 
vote of Congress, or even to employ the military force of the country except 
to defend our own territory, is very different from the protest of a sovereign 
holding the issues of peace and war in his own hands. But the former may 
not be less effectual when they are sustained, and I believe those of Presidents 
Monroe and Polk are, in respect to European interference on the American con- 
tinent, by an undivided public opinion, even though they may not have received 
a formal response from Congress. I hold, therefore, if any such interposition as 
that to which I have referred should take place, resistance on our part would 
inevitably follow, and we should become involved in controversies, of which 
no man could foresee the end. 

(Being part of a speech delivered in the United States Senate, January 26, 1848.) 





138 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Higher Law. 

By WILLIAM HENRY SEWARD, of New York. 

(Born 1801, died 1872.) 



1^ T is true, indeed, that the national domain is ours. It is true, it was 
acquired b}' the valor and the wealth of the whole nation. But we 
hold, nevertheless, no arbitrary power over it. We hold no arbitrary 
power over anything, whether acquired by law, or seized by usurpa- 
tion. The Constitution regulates our stewardship ; the Constitution 
devotes the domain to union, to justice, to welfare, and to liberty. 
But there is a higher /azl' than the Constitution, zchich regulates our authority 
over the domain, and devotes it to the saiiu^ nolde purpose. The territor}^ is a 
part, no inconsiderable part, of the common heritage of mankind, bestowed 
upon them by the Creator of the universe. We are his stewards, and must 
so discharge our trust as to secure, in the highest attainable degree, their hap- 
piness. This is a State, and we are deliberating for it, just as our fathers delib- 
erated in establishing the institutions we enjoy. Whatever superiority there is 
in our condition and hopes, over those of any other " kingdom '' or " estate," is 
due to the fortunate circumstance that our ancestors did not leave things to 
" take their chances," but that they " added amplitude and greatness " to our 
Commonwealth " by introducing such ordinances, constitutions, and customs as 
were wise." We in our turn have succeeded to the same responsibilities, and 
we cannot approach the duty before us wisely or justly, except we raise our- 
selves to the great consideration of how we can most certainly " sow greatness 
to our posterity and successors." 

And now the simple, bold, and awful question which presents itself to us 
is this : Shall we, who are founding institutions, social and political, for count- 
less millions ; shall we, who know by experience the wise and just, and are free 
to choose them, and to reject the erroneous and unjust ; shall we establish 
human bondage, or permit it, by our sufferance, to be established? Sir, our 
forefathers would not have hesitated an hour. They found slavery existing 
here, and they left it, only because they could not remove it. There is not only 
no free State which would now establish it, but there is no slave State which, if 
it had had the free alternative, as we now have, would have founded slavery. 




William H. Seward. 



140 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Indeed, our Revolutionary predecessors had precisely the same question before 
them in establishing an organic law, under which the States of Ohio, Michigan, 
Illinois, Wisconsin, and Iowa have since come into the Union, and they sol- 
emnly repudiated and excluded slavery from those States forever. 

The Union, the creation of the necessities physical, moral, social, and politi- 
cal, endures by virtue of the same necessities ; and these necessities are stronger 
than v.^hen it was produced, by the greater amplitude of territory now covered 
by it ; stronger than the sixfold increase of the society living under its beneficent 
protection ; stronger by the augmentation ten thousand times of the fields, the 
workshops, the mines, and the ships of that society, of its productions of the 
sea, of the plow, of the loom, and of the anvil, in their constant circle of internal 
and international exchanges ; stronger in the long rivers penetrating regions 
before unknown ; stronger in all the artificial roads, canals, and other channels 
and avenues essential, not only to trade, but to defense ; stronger in steam navi- 
gation, in steam locomotion on the land, and in telegraph communications un- 
known when the Constitution was adopted ; stronger in the freedom and in the 
growing empire of the seas ; stronger in the element of national honor in all 
lands, and stronger than all in the now settled habits of veneration and affection 
for institutions so stupendous and useful. 

(Being part of a speech delivered in the United States Senate, March ii, 1850.) 



. r-^ 



^,.-'M 





SLAVERY AND THE ANNEXATION OF CUBA. 141 



Slavery and the Annexation of Cuba. 



By JOSHUA R. GIDDINGS, of Ohio. 

(Born 1795, died 1864.) 



ND here I wish to say to the friends of Hberty that our cause is ad- 
vancing rapidly, and with firmer and surer pace than at any former 
period. The old political organizations have lost their moral power. 
The election of the great Western statesman, Thomas H. Benton, in 
opposition to both the Whig and Democratic parties, shows the 
tendency of men to think and vote agreeably to the dictates of their 
own judgment, and not according to caucus dictation, or party rule. He, sir, 
was unconnected with all parties. He was the exponent of his own views ; the 
people approved his sentiments, and, setting party dictation at defiance, they 
elected him. Nor was the election of the distinguished philanthropist from New 
York, Gerritt Smith, less a triumph of independent political thought and action. 
These distinguished gentlemen were connected with no political parties, but 
each was elected upon his own merits. * * * 

Again, sir, we have enlisted the literati of our country on the side of truth, 
liberty, and justice. To my fair country women I would say that a lady with 
her pen has done more for the cause of freedom, during the past year, than any 
savant, statesman, or politician of our land. That inimitable work, " Uncle 
Torn's Cabin," is now carrying truth to the minds of millions, who, to this time, 
have been deaf to the cries of the downtrodden. It is arousing the sensibilities 
of this country and of Europe. It goes where no other anti-slavery work ever 
found its way, and quietly carries conviction to the hearts of its readers. It 
has been dramatized, and, both in this country and in Europe, the playgoing 
public listen with intense interest to the wrongs, the revolting crimes of slavery. 
Thus, the theater, that " school of vice," has been subsidized to the promulga- 
tion of truth, and the hearts of thousands have been reached, who were approach- 
able in no other way. 

The clergy of the North are awakening to duty, to the calls of humanity. 
No longer are we called to listen to " lower law " sermons, nor are the feelings 



142 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of our Christian communities shocked by reading discourses from doctors of 
divinity, intended to sanctify and encourage the most transcendent crimes which 
ever disgraced mankind. Churches and ecclesiastical bodies are beginning to 
move in behalf of truth, of Christian principles. They are purifying themselves 
from those who deal in God's image ; they are withdrawing church fellowship 
from those pirates who deserve the gallows and halter, rather than a seat at 
the communion table of Christian churches. 

I have glanced at these facts in answer to those who have spoken before 
me, and for the encouragement of our friends, in order to assure them that while 
Whigs and Democrats in this hall are discussing the propriety of protecting 
" cotton cloth " and " cut nails," the advocates of freedom have not forgotten 
the duty of protecting the rights of our common humanity. 

But, Mr. Chairman, my principal object in rising was to call the attention 
of this body and of the country to the first of the series of resolutions presented 
by the honorable chairman of the Committee on Ways and INIeans (Mr. Houston). 
It refers to our " foreign relations." The position we hold toward the Govern- 
m.ents of Spain, Great Britain, and France is unusually important at this time. 
The recent publication of the correspondence between our Executive and the 
Spanish Ministry has excited a deep and pervading interest throughout the 
country. * * * 

This correspondence is highly important. It shows to the country and to 
the civilized world that for thirty years the Executive has exerted our national 
influence to maintain slavery in Cuba, in order that the institution may be 
rendered more secure in the United States. This policy stands out in bold re- 
lief ; it pervades the whole correspondence, and was also incorporated into the 
instructions of our commissioners to the Congress of Panama, although those 
instructions are not embraced in the communication now before us. 

Both Whig and Democratic administrations have adopted this policy ; and 
although I have but little time to read extracts from this correspondence, I will 
give one from the letter of Mr. Webster, Secretary of State, marked " Private 
and Confidential," to our Consul at Havana, dated January 14, 1843, i" which 
the author refers to reported intentions of British Abolitionists and the British 
Ministry to aid in the abolition of slavery and in the establishment of an inde- 
pendent government in Cuba. He says : " If this scheme should succeed, the 
influence of Britain in this quarter, it is remarked, will be" unlimited. With six 
hundred thousand blacks in Cuba, and eight hundred thousand in her West India 
islands, she will, it is said, strike a blow at the existence of slavery in the 
United States." These, sir, are the words of a man who opposed all expression, 
by this Government, of sympathy with oppressed Hungary ; who was so strongly 




Joshua R. Giddings. 



144 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

opposed to all intervention with the affairs of other governments in favor of 
liberty. 

We, sir, hold our own institutions by the right of revolution, which he so 
severely condemned. He appears to have been shocked at the idea that liberty 
should be enjoyed in Cuba, and avowed himself willing to prostitute the naval 
and military power of the United States to uphold a system of oppression in 
that island which consigns to premature graves one-tenth part of its whole slave 
population annually — a system by which eighty thousand human victims are 
said to be sacrificed every year to Spanish barbarity and cupidity. Sir, at this 
moment the Senate are engaged in eulogizing the statesman who has himself 
erected this monument to perpetuate his own disgrace. They, sir, are endeavor- 
ing to falsify the truth of history ; to cover up those stains upon his character 
which no time can erase, and no effort of friends can purify. * * * 

Mr. Chairman, I speak my own opinions. No other man is responsible for 
what I say. I have given some attention to this subject, and have satisfied my 
own mind that while the advocates of liberty shall continue their efforts for 
freedom, their struggles for justice to all men, Cuba will not be annexed. 1 
congratulate the friends of liberty and of humanity upon the important position 
they have attained. The very efforts which our opponents said would secure 
the annexation of Cuba have, under the circumstances to which I have referred, 
prevented the perpetration of that outrage. It is the bold, unflinching agitation 
and maintenance of truth, by political, moral, and religious efforts, that has 
saved us from that degradation. Had we, sir, united with the other political 
parties at the late election : had we then disbanded, there would have been 
danger of the annexation of Cuba, even at the price of war and bloodshed. But 
we have attained the position which enables us by our efforts to command the 
respect of our opponents; and, more especially, as our course commanded the 
respect of ourselves — of good men — of the lovers of liberty in this country 
and in Europe, and, as I humbly trust, the approval of God himself. Slavery 
can only flourish, it can only exist, in the quiet repose of peace. It cannot con- 
tinue amid the storm of war or the rage of moral elements. All history shows 
us that slavery cannot exist amidst the agitation of truth. Justice is the great 
moral antagonist of oppression. They cannot exist together. I indulge the 
hope that slavery has reached its limits ; that it cannot pass beyond its present 
boundaries, if we remain true to our purpose and our principles. Its proud 
waves are already stayed. Cuba must remain attached to the Crown of Spain. 
Yet I would say to British and to French statesmen that if they wish to obtain 
it for the purpose of establishing liberty there, of giving freedom to its down- 
trodden people, let them satisfy Spain and take the island. We shall submit for 



SLAVERY AND THE ANNEXATION OF CUBA. 



145 



the very obvious reason that while we hold our own siave population m sub- 
jection, we cannot enter into a war with either of those powers in order to main- 
tain that institution in Cuba. We, sir, would rather see Cuba free, under British 
or French rule, than see our fellow men oppressed, degraded, and ruthlessly 
murdered, under either Spanish or American authority. But if it remain subject 
to Spanish laws, its final redemption is not so far distant as we have been 
accustomed to think. * * * 

The world is moving in favor of liberty. Redemption to the African race 
upon this continent must soon come. I trust it will come in peace ; but I will 
add in the language of our departed coadjutor, John Quincy Adams : " Let it 
come ; if it must come in blood, yet I say, let it come." 

(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, December 14, 1852.) 





146 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Religious Freedom. 



By LEWIS CASS, of Michigan. 

(Born 1782, died 1866.) 



"HAT degree of force — of physical trial, rather — will obscure the moral 
judgment, is, perhaps, a question of bodily endurance as much as of 
mental fortitude. /\rchbishop Hughes, in his highly figurative lan- 
guage, has provided a " fortress to which the conscience can retreat, 
and from which it can hurl defiance against all invaders." This 
metaphor will hardly stand the test of critical scrutiny, and is out of 
place in a grave moral investigation. To carry out the figure, the fortress may 
be captured by hopes and by fears, by promises and by dangers, and the judgment 
seat usurped by passion and by prejudice. Occasionally, indeed, there have 
been wonderful examples of fortitude, of the conquest of the intellectual and 
moral feelings over physical sufiferings, and when the faith and perseverance of 
the martyrs have overcome the terrible efforts of the tortures, or have put the 
seal of death upon the principles and professions of life. But these are rare 
instances of success in the battle of truth ; and the moral philosopher, as well as 
the Christian commentator, who seeks in such extreme cases the general rule of 
human action, will find his speculations little suited to the world we inhabit. 
Both reason and faith reprove such assumptions, and no man is morally free 
when in the face of tortures and punishments, felt or impending. It requires 
no discussion to satisfy the inquirer after truth that intense suffering may so 
affect the moral faculties as to blunt their perception, and totally to derange 
their proper functions. To tell a man he enjoys full moral freedom while coerced 
by external force, is to mock at the first principles of intellectual action. 

But to pass from these speculations to practical inquiry : I desire to ask 
Archbishop Hughes what object he had in view in this effort to show that the 
human conscience is always free, whatever may be the external circumstances 
with which it may be surrounded, and that it is, therefore, absurd to fear its 
thraldom or to endeavor to guard against it? There is but one assignable 
reason for the assumption of this postulate, both physical and ethical in its 
character, and that is, an unwillingness to claim for any government the naked 




Lewis Cass. 



148 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

right to interfere with, or restrain or destroy the freedom of conscience. I do 
not beheve that Archbishop Hughes would advocate such a doctrine, so under- 
standing it; and certainly to do so would be a bold experiment upon the feel- 
ings of this country, which would be sure to be frowned down by public indig- 
nation. The difficulty of the position in which the Archbishop was placed re- 
sulted, on the one hand, from the opinion entertained by him that human law- 
makers have the right to legislate upon questions of religious worship, and on 
the other from a conviction that freedom of conscience is not within the pale 
of human authority; and the dilemma caused by these conflicting principles is 
to be avoided by reducing freedom of conscience to a mere operation of the 
mind, leaving it in its fortress, but leaving also to the tender mercies of the 
municipal magistrates the power to control and direct its dictates by all the 
terrible punishments which persecution has devised and faith endured. The 
grasp is upon the shadow, while the substance escapes. And the miiversal 
sentiment, that he alone is free who is free from violence, rebukes as a patent 
absurdity, originating in a confusion of ideas, which the Archbishop kindly under- 
takes to make clear. 

But, after all, the learned writer will find that it required no new Galileo 
to explore the human intellect, in order to discover and announce that the 
mind of man is beyond the direct jurisdiction of earthly laws. It is to measure 
the knowledge of the world by a low standard indeed to suppose that this 
obvious truth had so long escaped its penetration. In fact, it was as well 
known on the day of the exodus from Eden as it now is, even with the benefit 
of the distinguished prelate's labors. 

But at best, according to the Archbishop's own showing, this branch of 
the inquiry degenerates into a verbal disquisition. The world chooses to call 
the freedom of external action the freedom of conscience, which he considers 
little better than an absurdity. Be it so ; but this leaves the question just where 
we found it. A change of nomenclature does not change the object, which is 
to protect the conscience of man from human legislation, by denying to it juris- 
diction over those duties which conscience dictates. And this is the very propo- 
sition to which Archbishop Hughes finally comes, and fights against most 
manfully. 

He precedes his statement, however, with the declaration, that to assert the 
existence of any power capable of destroying 'freedom of conscience is a patent 
absurdity, because " conscience without freedom is not conscience, but for this 
very reason the freedom of conscience is beyond man's power." Its freedom is 
beyond the reach of man, not because the faculty is invisible and intangible, 



RELIGIOUS FREEDOM. 149 

but because it is indestructible and unassailable. As I would not misrepresent, 
and do not understand this process of reasoning, I must leave it to some other 
commentator. 

The rights of conscience, the liberty of conscience, are, in fact, but syn- 
onyms, all expressing the same general sentiment, that every man has the 
right to follow the dictates of that moral guide, so far as he is not prohibited 
by law, either divine or human, and that it is the duty of every government 
to abstain from all interference with this right, unless in cases fairly involving 
the peace and good order of society. The enjoyment of this freedom, in this 
sense, has been one of the great objects of wise men in all ages, and is es- 
pecially so in this, wherever the first notions of liberty have penetrated. But 
it will be remarked, that this use of the term " freedom " is rather a jus ct norma 
loqiicndi than a strict application of it in its true meaning. Freedom cannot be 
predicated of a faculty of the mind or body. It belongs to the sentient being. 
Freedom of speech is the freedom of a man to speak, not the mere command 
of the vocal organs. Freedom of action, to act. Freedom of conscience, to 
obey and be governed by the dictates of that great monitor. A man is a free 
agent, if all his powers and faculties are unrestricted ; otherwise he is not free ; 
always excepting, however, proper legal restraints from the class of injurious 
restrictions. 

This somewhat metaphorical application of these terms cannot be made 
the foundation of a great moral deduction. But Archbishop Hughes has made 
them so, and maintains that freedom is so essential an attribute of conscience 
that without it the faculty itself would cease to exist, but that being inde- 
structible, its indestructibility is a proof of its freedom. It is obvious that he 
is here referring to the free agency of the faculty, and not of the sentient being 
of whose intellectual powers it forms part ; for he will not deny, no one will 
deny, that the individual himself may be deprived of almost every attribute of 
free agency. 

The Archbishop kindly accounts for, and charitably excuses, my erroneous 
views on this subject, by the " confusion of ideas " resulting from ignorance of 
his great moral discovery of the difference between freedom of conscience and 
freedom of action, in obedience to its dictates. I can accept neither the charge 
nor the excuse. Though, indeed, my participation in this assumed logical 
heresy is of no consequence, nor would my conviction of it furnish the least 
ground, even of self-complacency, for beyond me is the opinion, I may say, 
of the world, that this priceless freedom is the freedom of action, as well as of 
opinion, and in conformity with it the sentiment itself is embodied in our Con- 



150 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

stitutions and State papers, and is embalmed in the hearts of the American 
people, and it is to be found, as a self-evident truth, even in the school-books 
which form the minds of our youth. One of the purest of our patriots, one 
of the wisest and most accomplished of our statesmen, the virtuous Madison, 
has left his testimony upon record in opposition to this new assumption, in his 
inaugural address in 1809. in which he enumerates among- our fundamental 
principles the duty of avoiding " the slightest interference with the rights of 
conscience," not the abstract right of thinking, but the practical right of decid- 
ing upon moral convictions, and of acting accordingly. And who that knew 
James Madison will dare to talk of the confusion of his ideas? 

To multiply specific examples of the use and true meaning of this phrase 
would be a profitless and uncalled-for task, and I shall not undertake it. I 
shall content myself with four other authorities, all of which have peculiar 
claims to the consideration of Arclibisliop Hughes. One is the celebrated 
jurist Vattel, who. while maintaining, agreeabl}' to the fashion of his age, the 
right of the sovereign to establish a State religion, and to make that the only 
one openly professed, earnestly reprolDates all attempts to compel men to con- 
form to it by municipal laws, and finally remarks : 

" It must, then, be concluded, that liberty of conscience is a natural and 
inviolable right. It is a disgrace to human nature that a truth of this kind 
should stand in need of truth." 

What is this liberty of conscience, thus inviolable, and the denial of which 
is so sternly rebuked? Not Archbishop Hughes's power of thinking — for no 
man in his senses ever denied that; but it is "freedom from compulsion" — 
these are the words of the author — without which this moral agent, inviolable 
as it should be, is violated, " to the disgrace of human nature." * * * 

(From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, May 15, 1854.) 




mruuvt r j:.\JMS-jn,„ miiu i g 



i»* P^ji^0^^0^ 





THE PILGRIM FATHERS. 151 



The Pilgrim Fathers. 

By ROBERT CHARLES WINTHROP, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1809, died 1894.) 



'HEN I behold a feeble company of exiles, quitting the strange land to 
which persecution had forced them to flee ; entering with so many 
sighs and sobs and partings and prayers on a voyage so full of perils 
at the best, but rendered a hundredfold more perilous by the unusual 
severities of the season and the absolute unseaworthiness of their ship ; 
arriving in the depth of winter on a coast to which even their pilot was 
a perfect stranger, and where " they had no friends to welcome them, no inns to 
entertain them, no houses, much less towns, to repair unto for succor," but 
where — instead of friends, shelter, or refreshment — famine, exposure, the 
v/olf, the savage, disease, and death, seemed waiting for them ; and yet accom- 
plishing an end which royalty and patronage, the love of dominion and of gold, 
individual adventure and corporate enterprise had so long essayed in vain, and 
founding a colony which was to defy alike the machinations and the menaces of 
tyranny, in all periods of its history — it needs not that I should find the coral 
pathway of the sea laid bare, and its waves a wall on the right hand and on the 
left, and the crazed chariot-wheels of the oppressor floating in fragments upon 
its closing floods, to feel, to realize, that higher than human was the power 
which presided over the exodus of the Pilgrim Fathers ! 

Was it not something more than the ignorance or the self-will of our 
earthly and visible pilot, which, instead of conducting them to the spot which 
they had deliberately selected — the very spot on which we are now assembled, 
the banks of your own beautiful Hudson, of which they had heard so much 
during their sojourn in Holland, but which was then swarming with a host of 
liorrible savages — guided them to a coast which, though bleaker and far less 
hospitable in its outward aspect, had yet, by an extraordinary epidemic, but a 
short time previous, been almost completely cleared of its barbarous tenants? 
Was it not something more, also, than mere mortal error or human mistake, 
which, instead of bringing them within the limits prescribed in the patent they 
had procured in England, directed them to a shore on which they were to land 




Robert Charles Winthrop. 



THE PILGRIM FATHERS. 153 

upon their own responsibility and under their own authority, and thus com- 
pelled them to an act which has rendered Cape Cod more memorable than 
Runnymede, and the cabin of The Mayflower than the proudest hall of ancient 
charter or modern constitution — the execution of the first written original con- 
tract of Democratic Self-Government which is found in the annals of the world. 
But the Pilgrims, I have said, had a power within them also. If God was 
not seen among them in the fire of a Horeb, in the earthquake of a Sinai, or in 
the wind cleaving asunder the waves of the sea they were to cross, he was 
with them, at least, in the still, small voice. Conscience, conscience, was the 
nearest to an earthly power which the Pilgrims possessed, and the freedom of 
conscience the nearest to an earthly motive which prompted their career. It 
was conscience which " weaned them from the delicate milk of their mother 
country, and inured them to the difficulties of a strange land." It was con- 
science which made them not as other men, whom small things could dis- 
courage, or small discontentments cause to wish themselves at home again. It 
was conscience — that " rohur et aes triplex circapectus " — which emboldened 
them to launch their fragile bark upon a merciless ocean, fearless of the lighting 
winds and lowering storms. It was conscience which stiffened them to brave 
the perils, endure the hardships, undergo the privations of a howling, houseless, 
hopeless desolation. And thus, almost in the very age when the Great Master 
of human nature was putting into the mouth of one of his most interesting and 
philosophical characters that well-remembered conclusion of a celebrated 
soliloquy : 

"Thus conscience does make cowards of us all; 

And thus the native hue of resolution 

Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; 

And enterprises of great pith and moment 

With this regard, their currents turn awry, 

And lose the name of action," — 

this very conscience, a clog, and an obstacle, indeed, to its foes, but the surest 
strength and sharpest spur of its friends, was inspiring a courage, confirming 
a resolution, and accomplishing an enterprise, to which the records of the world 
will be searched in vain to find a parallel. Let it never be forgotten that it was 
conscience, and that not intrenched behind broad seals, but enshrined in brave 
souls, which carried through and completed the long-baffled undertaking of 
settling the New England coast. 

(Being part of an address before the New England Society in 1839.) 




J 54 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Kansas-Nebraska Bill. 



By STEPHEN ARNOLD DOUGLAS, of Illinois. 

(Bom 1813, died 1861.) 



iHE principle which we propose to carry into effect by the bill is this: 
That Congress shall neither legislate slavery into any Territories or State, 
nor out of the same; but the people shall be left free to regulate their 
domestic eoncerns in their ozvn zvay, subject only to the Constitution of the 
United States. 

In order to carry this principle into practical operation, it becomes 
necessary to remove whatever legal obstacles might be found in the way of its 
free exercise. It is only for the purpose of carrying out this great fundamental 
principle of self-government that the bill renders the eighth section of the 
Missouri act inoperative and void. 

Now, let me ask, will these Senators who have arraigned me, or any one of 
them, have the assurance to rise in his place and declare that this great prin- 
ciple was never thought of or advocated as applicable to territorial bills, in 
1850; that from that session until the present, nobody ever thought of incor- 
porating this principle in all new territorial organizations ; that the Committee 
on Territories did not recommend it in their report ; and that it required the 
amendment of the Senator from Kentucky to bring us up to that point? Will 
any one of my accusers dare to make this issue, and let it be tried by the record? 
I will begin with the compromises of 1850. Any Senator who will take the 
trouble to examine our journals, will find that on the 25th of March of that 
year I reported from the Committee on Territories two bills including the fol- 
lowing measures ; the admission of California, a territorial government for 
New Mexico, and the adjustment of the Texas boundary. These bills pro- 
posed to leave the people of Utah and New Mexico free to decide the slavery 
question for themselves, in the precise language of the Nebraska bill nozv under 
discussion. A few weeks afterward the Committee of Thirteen took those two 
bills and put a wafer between them, and reported them back to the Senate as 




Stephen Arnold Douglas. 



156 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

one bill, with some slight amendments. One of these amendments was, that the 
territorial legislatures should not legislate upon the subject of African slavery. 
I objected to that provision upon the ground that it subverted the great prin- 
ciple of self-government upon which the bill had been originally framed by the 
Territorial Committee. On the first trial, the Senate refused to strike it out, 
but subsequently did so, after full debate, in order to establish that principle as 
the rule of action in territorial organizations. * * * But my accusers attempt 
to raise up a false issue, and thereby divert public attention from the real one, 
by the cry that the Missouri compromise is to be repealed or violated by the 
passage of this bill. Well, if the eighth section of the Missouri act, which at- 
tempted to fix the destinies of future generations in those Territories for all 
time to come, in utter disregard of the rights and wishes of the people when 
the> should be received into the Union as States, be inconsistent with the great 
principles of self-government and the Constitution of the United States, it ought 
to be abrogated. The legislation of 1850 abrogated the Missouri compromise, 
so far as the country embraced within the limits of Utah and New Mexico was 
covered by the slavery restriction. It is true, that those acts did not in terms 
and by name repeal the act of 1820, as originally adopted, or as extended 
by the resolutions annexing Texas in 1845, any more than the report of the 
Committee on Territories proposed to repeal the same acts this session. But 
the acts of 1850 did authorize the people of those Territories to exercise " all 
rightful powers of legislation consistent with the Constitution," not excepting 
the question of slavery; and did provide that, when those Territories should be 
admitted into the Urnon, they should be received with or without slavery as 
the people thereof might determine at the date of their admission. These pro- 
visions were in direct conflict with a clause in the former enactment, declaring 
that slavery should be forever prohibited in any portion of said Territories, and 
hence rendered such clause inoperative and void to the extent of such conflict. 
This was an inevitable consequence, resulting from the provisions in those acts, 
which gave the people the right to decide the slavery question for themselves, 
in conformity with the Constitution. It was not necessary to go farther and 
declare that certain previous enactments, which were incompatible with the 
exercise of the powers conferred in the bills, are hereby repealed. The very 
act of granting those powers and rights has the legal effect of removing all 
obstructions to the exercise of them by the people, as prescribed in those ter- 
ritorial bills. Following that example, the Committee on Territories did not 
consider it necessary to declare the eighth section of the Missouri act repealed. 
We were content to organize Nebraska in the precise language of the Utah 
and New Mexican bills. Our object was to leave the people entirely free to form 



THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA BILL. 157 

and regulate their domestic institutions and internal concerns in their own way, 
under the Constitution ; and we deemed it wise to accomplish that object in the 
exact terms in which the same thing had been done in Utah and New Mexico 
by the acts of 1850. This was the principle upon which the committee voted ; 
and our bill was supposed, and is now believed, to have been in accordance 
with it. When doubts were raised whether the bill did fully carry out the prin- 
ciple laid down in the report, amendments were made from time to time, in 
order to avoid all misconstruction, and make the true intent of the act more 
explicit. The last of these amendments was adopted yesterday, on the motion 
of the distinguished Senator from North Carolina (Mr. Badger), in regard to 
the revival of any laws or regulations which may have existed prior to 1820. 
That amendment was not intended to change the legal effect of the bill. Its 
object was to repel the slander which had been propagated by the enemies of 
the measure in the North — that the Southern supporters of the bill desired to 
legislate slavery into these Territories. The South denies the right of Congress 
either to legislate slavery into any Territory or State, or out of any Territory 
or State. Non-intervention by Congress with slavery in the States or Territories 
is the doctrine of the bill, and all the amendments which have been agreed to 
have been made with the view of removing all doubt and cavil as to the true 
meaning and object of the measure. * * * 

Well, sir, what is this Missouri compromise, of which we have heard so 
much of late? It has been read so often that it is not necessary to occupy the 
time of the Senate in reading it again. It was an act of Congress, passed on the 
6th of March, 1820, to authorize the people of Missouri to form a Constitution 
and a State Government, preparatory to the admission of such State into the 
Union. The first section provided that Missouri should be received into the 
Union " on an equal footing with the original States in all respects whatsoever." 
The last and eighth section provided that slavery should be " forever prohibited " 
in all the territory which had been acquired from France north of 36° 30', and 
not included within the limits of the State of Missouri. There is nothing in the 
terms of the law that purports to be a compact, or indicates that it was anything 
more than an ordinary act of legislation. To prove that it was more than it 
purports to be on its face, gentlemen must produce other evidence, and prove 
that there was such an understanding as to create a moral obligation in the 
nature of a compact. Have they shown it? 

Now, if this was a compact, let us see how it was entered into. The bill 
originated in the House of Representatives, and passed that body without a 
Southern vote in its favor. It is proper to remark, however, that it did not at 
that time contain the eighth section, prohibiting slavery in the Territories; but 



158 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

in lieu of it, contained a provision prohibiting slavery in the proposed State of 
Missouri. In the Senate, the clause prohibiting slavery in the State was stricken 
out, and the eighth section added to the end of the bill, by the terms of which 
slavery was to be forever prohibited in the territory not embraced in the State 
of Missouri north of 36° 30'. The vote on adding this section stood in the 
Senate, 34 in the affirmative, and 10 in the negative. Of the Northern Senators, 
20 voted for it, and 2 against it. On the question of ordering the bill to a third 
reading as amended, which was the test vote on its passage, the vote stood 24 
yeas and 20 nays. Of the Northern Senators, 4 only voted in the affirmative. 
and 18 in the negative. Thus it will be seen that if it was intended to be a com- 
pact, the North never agreed to it. The Northern Senators voted to insert the 
prohibition of slavery in the Territories ; and then, in the proportion of more 
than four to one, voted against the passage of the bill. The North, therefore, 
never signed the compact, never consented to it, never agreed to be bound by 
it. This fact becomes very important in vindicating the character of the North 
for repudiating this alleged compromise a few months afterward. The act was 
approved and became a law on the 6th of March, 1820. In the summer of that 
year, the people of Missouri formed a Constitution and State Government pre- 
paratory to admission into the Union in conformity with the act. At the next 
session of Congress the Senate passed a joint resolution declaring Missouri to 
be one of the States of the Union, on an equal footing with the original States. 
This resolution was sent to the House of Representatives, where it was rejected 
by Northern votes, and thus Missouri was voted out of the Union, instead 
of being received into the Union under the act of the 6th of March, 1820, now 
known as the Missouri compromise. Now, sir, what becomes of our plighted 
faith, if the act of the 6th of March, 1820, was a solemn compact, as we are now 
told? They have all rung the changes upon it, that it was a sacred and irrev- 
ocable compact, binding in honor, in conscience, and morals, which could not 
be violated or repudiated without perfidy and dishonor !*=!=* Sir, if this 
was a compact, what must be thought of those who violated it almost imme- 
diately after it was formed? I say it is a calumny upon the North to say that 
it was a compact. I should feel a flush of shame upon my cheek, as a Northern 
man, if I were to say that it was a compact, and that the section of the country 
to which I belong received the consideration, and then repudiated the obliga- 
tion in eleven months after it was entered into. I deny that it was a compact, 
in any sense of the term. But if it was, the record proves that faith was not 
observed — that the contract was never carried into effect — that after the North 
had procured the passage of the act prohibiting slavery in the Terrirories, with 
a majority in the House large enough to prevent its repeal, Missouri was refused 



THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA BILL. 159 

admission into the Union as a slave-holding State, in conformity with the act of 
March 6, 1820. If the proposition be correct, as contended for by the opponents 
of this bill — that there was a solemn compact between the North and South 
that, in the consideration of the prohibition of slavery in the Territories, Mis- 
souri was to be admitted into the Union, in conformity with the act of 1820 — 
that compact was repudiated by the North, and rescinded by the joint action of 
the two parties within twelve months from its date. Missouri was never ad- 
mitted under the act of the 6th of March, 1820. She was refused admission un- 
der that act. She was voted out of the Union by Northern votes, notwithstand- 
ing the stipulation that she should be received ; and, in consequence of these 
facts, a new compromise was rendered necessary, by the terms of which Mis- 
souri was to be admitted into the Union conditionally — admitted on a con- 
dition not embraced in the act of 1820, and, in addition, to a full compliance 
with all the provisions of said act. If, then, the act of 1820, by the eighth sec- 
tion of which slavery was prohibited in Missouri, was a compact, it is clear 
to the comprehension of every fair-minded man that the refusal of the North to 
admit Missouri, in compliance with its stipulations, and without further con- 
ditions, imposes upon us a high, moral obligation to remove the prohibition of 
slavery in the Territories, since it has been shown to have been procured upon 
a condition never performed. * * * 

The Declaration of Independence had its origin in the violation of that 
great fundamental principle which secured to the colonies the right to regulate 
their own domestic affairs in their own way ; and the Revolution resulted in the 
triumph of that principle, and the recognition of the right asserted by it. Aboli- 
tionism proposes to destroy the right and extinguish the principle for which 
our forefathers waged a seven years' bloody war, and upon which our whole 
system of free government is founded. They not only deny the application of 
this principle to the Territories, but insist upon fastening the prohibition upon 
all the States to be formed out of those Territories. Therefore, the doctrine of 
the Abolitionists — the doctrine of the opponents of the Nebraska and Kansas 
bill, and the advocates of the Missouri restriction — demands congressional in- 
terference with slavery not only in the Territories, but in all the new States to 
be formed therefrom. It is the same doctrine, when applied to the Territories 
and new States of this Union, which the British Government attempted to en- 
force by the sword upon the American colonies. It is this fundamental prin- 
ciple of self-government which constitutes the distinguishing feature of the 
Nebraska bill. The opponents of the principle are consistent in opposing the 
bill. I do not blame them for their opposition. I only ask them to meet the issue 
fairly and openly, by acknowledging that they are opposed to the principle which 



i6o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

it is the object of the bill to carry into operation. It seems that there is no 
power on earth, no intellectual power, no mechanical power, that can bring 
them to a fair discussion of the true issue. If they hope to delude the people 
and escape detection for any considerable length of time under the catchwords, 
" Missouri compromise " and " faith of compacts," they will find that the people 
of this country have more penetration and intelligence than they have given 
them credit for. 

Mr. President, there is an important fact connected with this slavery regu- 
lation, which should never be lost sight of. It has always arisen from one and 
the same cause. Whenever that cause has been removed, the agitation has 
ceased ; and whenever the cause has been renewed, the agitation has sprung 
into existence. That cause is, and ever has been, the attempt on the part of 
Congress to interfere with the question of slavery in the Territories and new 
States formed therefrom. Is it not wise, then, to confine our action within the 
sphere of our legitimate duties, and leave this vexed question to take care of 
itself in each State and Territory, according to the wishes of the people thereof, 
in conformity to the forms, and in subjection to the provisions, of the Con- 
stitution ? 

The opponents of the bill tell us that agitation is no part of their policy ; 
that their great desire is peace and harmony ; and they complain bitterly that I 
should have disturbed the repose of the country by the introduction of this 
measure ! Let me ask these professed friends of peace, and avowed enemies of 
agitation, how the issue could have been avoided. They tell me that I should 
have let the question alone ; that is. that I should have left Nebraska unorgan- 
ized, the people unprotected, and the Indian barrier in existence, until the 
swelling tide of emigration should burst through, and accomplish by violence 
what it is the part of wisdom and statesmanship to direct and regulate by law. 
How long could you have postponed action with safety? How long could you 
maintain that Indian barrier, and restrain the onward march of civilization, 
Christianity, and free government by a barbarian wall ? Do you suppose that 
you could keep that vast country a howling wilderness in all time to come, 
roamed over by hostile savages, cutting ofT all safe communication between our 
Atlantic and Pacific possessions? I tell you that the time for action has come, 
and cannot be postponed. It is a case in which the " let-alone " policy would 
precipitate a crisis which must inevitably result in violence, anarchy, and strife. 

You cannot fix bounds to the onward march of this great and growing 
country. You cannot fetter the limbs of the young giant. He will burst all 
your chains. He will expand, and grow, and increase, and extend civilization, 
Christianity, and liberal principles. Then, sir, if you cannot check the growth 



THE KANSAS-NEBRASKA BILL. i6i 

of the country in that direction, is it not the part of wisdom to look the danger 
in the face, and provide for an event which you cannot avoid? I tell you, sir, 
you must provide for lines of continuous settlement from the Mississippi valley 
to the Pacific ocean. And in making this provision, you must decide upon what 
principles the Territories shall be organized ; in other words, whether the people 
shall be allowed to regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, ac- 
cording to the provisions of this bill, or whether the opposite doctrine of con- 
gressional interference is to prevail. Postpone it, if you will ; but whenever you 
do act, this question must be met and decided. * * * 

There is another reason why I desire to see this principle recognized as a 
rule of action in all time to come. It will have the effect to destroy all sectional 
parties and sectional agitations. If, in the language of the report of the com- 
mittee, you withdraw the slavery question from the halls of Congress and the 
political arena, and commit it to the arbitrament of those who are immediately 
interested in and alone responsible for its consequences, there is nothing left 
out of which sectional parties can be organized. It never was done, and never 
can be done on the bank, tariff, distribution, or any party issue which has ex- 
isted, or may exist, after this slavery question is withdrawn from politics. On 
every other political question these have always supporters and opponents in 
every portion of the Union — in each State, county, village, and neighborhood 
— residing together in harmony and good fellowship, and combating each other's 
opinions and correcting each other's errors in a spirit of kindness and friend- 
ship. These dififerences of opinion betv/een neighbors and friends, and the dis- 
cussions that grow out of them, and the sympathy which each feels with the 
advocates of his own opinions in every portion of this widespread Republic, add 
an overwhelming and irresistible moral weight to the strength of the Confed- 
eracy. Affection for the Union can never be alienated or diminished by any 
other party issues than those which are joined upon sectional or geographical 
lines. When the people of the North shall all be rallied under one banner, and 
the whole South marshaled under another banner, and each section excited to 
frenzy and madness by hostility to the institutions of the other, then the patriot 
may well tremble for the perpetuity of the Union. Withdraw the slavery ques- 
tion from the political arena, and remove it to the States and Territories, each 
to decide for itself, such a catastrophe can never happen. Then you will never 
be able to tell, by any Senator's vote for or against any measure, from what 
State or section of the Union he comes. 

Why, then, can we not withdraw this vexed question from politics? Why 
can we not adopt the principle of this bill as a rule of action in all new territorial 
organizations? Why can we not deprive these agitators of their vocation and 



I02 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



render it impossible for Senators to come here upon bargains on the slavery 
question? I believe that the peace, the harmony, and perpetuity of the Union 
require us to go back to the doctrines of the Revolution, to the principles of 
the Constitution, to the principles of the Compromise of 1850, and leave the 
people, under the Constitution, to do as they may see proper in respect to their 
own internal affairs. * * * 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, March 3, 1854.) 



^!^ 








A PLEA FOR COMPROMISE. 163 



A Plea for Compromise. 

By HENRY CLAY, of Kentucky. 

(Born 1777, died 1852.) 



HE responsibility of this great measure passes from the hands of the 
committee, and from my hands. They know, and I know, that it is an 
awful and tremendous responsibility. I hope that you will meet it with 
a just conception and a true appreciation of its magnitude, and the 
magnitude of the consequences that may ensue from your decision one 
way or the other. The alternatives, I fear, which the measure presents, 
are concord and increased discord ; a servile civil war, originating in its causes 
on the lower Rio Grande, and terminating possibly in its consequences on the 
upper Rio Grande in the Santa Fe country, or the restoration of harmony and 
fraternal kindness. I believe, from the bottom of my soul, that the measure is 
the reunion of this Union. I believe it is the dove of peace, which, taking its 
aerial flight from the dome of the Capitol, carries the glad tidings of assured 
peace and restored harmony to all the remotest extremities of this distracted 
land. I believe that it will be attended with all these beneficent effects. And 
now let us discard all resentment, all passions, all petty jealousies, all personal 
desires, all love of place, all hankerings after the gilded crumbs which fall from 
the table of power. Let us forget popular fears, from whatever quarter they 
may spring. Let us go to the limpid fountain of unadulterated patriotism, and, 
performing a solemn lustration, return divested of all selfish, sinister, and sordid 
impurities, and think alone of our God, our country, our consciences, and our 
glorious Union — ■ that Union without which we shall be torn into hostile frag- 
ments, and sooner or later become the victims of military despotism, or foreign 
domination. 

Mr. President, what is an individual man? An atom, almost invisible with- 
out a magnifying glass — a mere speck upon the surface of the immense uni- 
verse; not a second in time, compared to immeasurable, never-beginning, and 
never-ending eternity ; a drop of water in the great deep, which evaporates and is 
borne off by the winds ; a grain of sand, which is soon gathered to the dust 
from which it sprung. Shall a being so small, so petty, so fleeting, so evanes- 
cent, oppose itself to the onward march of a great nation, which is to subsist for 



i64 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

ages and ages to come ; oppose itself to that long line of posterity, which, issuing 
from our loins, will endure during the existence of the world? Forbid it, God. 
Let us look to our country and our cause, elevate ourselves to the dignity of 
pure and disinterested patriots, and save our covmtry from all impending dan- 
gers. What if, in the march of this nation to greatness and power, we should 
be buried beneath the wheels that propel it onward ! What are we — what is 
any man — worth who is not ready and willing to sacrifice himself for the benefit 
of his country when it is necessary? * * * 

If this Union shall become separated, new unions, new confederacies will 
arise. And with respect to this, if there be any — I hope there is no one in the 
Senate — before whose imagination is flitting the idea of a great Southern Con- 
federacy to take possession of the Balize and the mouth of the Mississippi, I say 
in m}' place, never ! never ! never ! will we who occupy the broad waters of the 
Mississippi and its upper tributaries consent that any foreign flag shall float al 
the Balize or upon the turrets of the Crescent City — never ! never ! I call upon 
all the South. Sir, we have had hard words, bitter words, bitter thoughts, 
unpleasant feelings toward each other in the progress of this great measure. 
Let us forget them. Let us sacrifice these feelings. Let us go to the altar of 
our country and swear, as the oath was taken of old, that we will stand by her ; 
that we will support her ; that we will uphold her Constitution ; that we will pre- 
serve her Union ; that we will pass this great, comprehensive, and healing system 
of measures, which will hush all the jarring elements, and bring peace and 
tranquillity to our homes. 

(Delivered in the Senate of the United States, July 22, 1850.) 





THE CRIME AGAINST KANSAS. 165 



The Crime Against Kansas. 

By CHARLES SUMNER, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 181 1, died 1874.) 



R. PRESIDENT: You are now called to redress a great transgres- 
sion. Seldom in the history of nations has such a question been pre- 
sented. Tariffs, army bills, navy bills, land bills are important, and 
justly occupy your care ; but these all belong to the course of ordi- 
nary legislation. As means and instruments only, they are neces- 
sarily subordinate to the conservation of government itself. Grant 
them or deny them, in greater or less degree, and you will inflict no shock. 
The machinery of government will continue to move. The State will not cease 
to exist. Far otherwise is it with the eminent question now before you, in- 
volving, as it does, liberty in a broad territory, and also involving the peace of 
the whole country, with our good name in history forever more. 

Take down your map, sir, and you will find that the Territory of Kansas, 
more than any other region, occupies the middle spot of North America, equally 
distant from the Atlantic on the east, and the Pacific on the west; from the 
frozen waters of Hudson's bay on the north, and the tepid Gulf Stream on the 
south, constituting the precise territorial center of the whole vast continent. 
To such advantages of situation, on the very highway between two oceans, are 
added a soil of unsurpassed richness, and a fascinating, undulating beauty of 
surface, with a health-giving climate, calculated to nurture a powerful and gen- 
erous people, worthy to be a central pivot of American institutions. A few 
short months only have passed since this spacious and mediterranean country 
was open only to the savage who ran wild in its woods and prairies ; and now it 
has already drawn to its bosom a population of freemen larger than Athens 
crowded within her historic gates, when her sons, under Miltiades, won liberty 
for mankind on the field of Marathon ; more than Sparta contained when she 
ruled Greece, and sent forth her devoted children, quickened by a mother's bene- 
diction, to return with their shields, or on them ; more than Rome gathered on 
her seven hills, when, under her kings, she commenced that sovereign sway, 
which afterward embraced the whole earth ; more than London held when, on 



i66 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

the fields of Crecy and Agincourt, the EngHsh banner was carried victoriously 
over the chivalrous hosts of France. 

Against this Territory, thus fortunate in position and population, a crime 
has been committed, which is without example in the records of the past. Not 
in plundered provinces or in the cruelties of selfish Governors will you find its 
parallel ; and yet there is an ancient instance, which may show at least the path 
of justice. In the terrible impeachment by which the great Roman orator has 
blasted through all time the name of Verres, amid charges of robbery and 
sacrilege, the enormity which most aroused the indignant voice of his accuser, 
and which still stands forth with strongest distinctness, arresting the sympathetic 
indignation of all who read the story, is, that away in Sicily he had scourged a 
citizen of Rome — that the cry, " I am a Roman citizen," had been interposed 
in vain against the lash of the tyrant Governor. Other charges were, that he 
had carried away productions of art, and that he had violated the sacred shrines. 
It was in the presence of the Roman Senate that this arraignment proceeded ; 
in a temple of the Forum ; amidst crowds — such as no orator had ever before 
drawn together — thronging the porticoes and colonnades, even clinging to the 
housetops and neighboring slopes — and under the anxious gaze of witnesses 
summoned from the scene of crime. But an audience grander far — of higher 
dignity — of more various people, and of wider intelligence — the countless 
multitude of succeeding generations, in every land, where eloquence has been 
studied, or where the Roman name has been recognized — has listened to the 
accusation, and throbbed with condemnation of the criminal. Sir, speaking in 
an age of light, and a land of constitutional liberty, where the safeguards of 
elections are justly placed among the highest triumphs of civilization, I fear- 
lessly assert that the wrongs of much-abused Sicily, thus memorable in history, 
were small by the side of the wrongs of Kansas, where the very shrines of popular 
institutions, more sacred than any heathen altar, have been desecrated ; where 
the ballot-box, more precious than any work, in ivory or marble, from the cun- 
ning hand of art, has been plundered ; and where the cry, " I am an American 
citizen," has been interposed in vain against outrage of every kind, even upon 
life itself. Are you against sacrilege? I present it for your execration. Are 
you against robbery? I hold it up to your scorn. Are you for the protection 
of American citizens? I show you how their dearest rights have been cloven 
down, while a tyrannical usurpation has sought to install itself on their very 
necks ! 

But the wickedness which I now begin to expose is immeasurably aggra- 
vated by the motive which prompted it. Not in any common lust for power 
did this uncommon tragedy have its origin. It is the rape of a virgin Territory, 




Charles Sumner. 



i68 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

compelling it to the hateful embrace of slavery ; and it may be clearly traced to 
a depraved longing for a new slave State, the hideous offspring of such a crime, 
in the hope of adding to the power of slavery in the National Government. Yes, 
sir; when the whole world, alike Christian and Turk, is rising up to condemn 
this wrong, and to make it a hissing to the nations, here in our Republic, force 
— ay, sir, force — has been openly employed in compelling Kansas to this 
pollution, and all for the sake of political power. There is the simple fact, which 
you will in vain attempt to deny, but which in itself presents an essential wicked- 
ness that makes other public crimes seem like public virtues. 

But this enormity, vast beyond comparison, swells to dimensions of wicked- 
ness which the imagination toils in vain to grasp, when it is understood that 
for this purpose are hazarded the horrors of intestine feud not only in this dis- 
tant Territory, but everywhere throughout the country. Already the muster 
has begun. The strife is no longer local, but national. Even now, while I 
speak, portents hang on all the arches of the horizon threatening to darken the 
broad land, which already yawns with the mutterings of civil war. The fury 
of the propagandists of slavery, and the calm determination of their opponents, 
are now diffused from the distant Territory over widespread communities, and 
the whole country, in all its extent — marshaling hostile divisions, and fore- 
shadowing a strife which, unless happily averted by the triumph of freedom, 
will become war — fratricidal, parricidal war — with an accumulated wickedness 
beyond the wickedness of any war in human annals ; justly provoking the aveng- 
ing judgment of Providence and the avenging pen of history, and constituting a 
strife, in the language of the ancient writer, more than -foreign, more than social, 
more than ciz'il; but something compounded of all these strifes, and in itself 
more than war ; sed potiiis commune quoddam ex omnibus, et plus quam helium. 

Such is the crime which you are to judge. But the criminal also must be 
dragged into day, that you may see and measure the power by which all this 
wrong is sustained. From no common source could it proceed. In its per- 
petration was needed a spirit of vaulting ambition which would hesitate at 
nothing ; a hardihood of purpose which was insensible to the judgment of man- 
kind ; a madness for slavery which would disregard the Constitution, the laws, 
and all the great examples of our history ; also a consciousness of power such 
as comes from the habit of power; a combination of energies found only in a 
hundred arms directed by a hundred eyes ; a control of public opinion through 
venal pens and a prostituted press ; an ability to subsidize crowds in every voca- 
tion of life — the politician with his local importance, the lawyer with his subtle 
tongue, and even the authority of the judge on the bench ; and a familiar use of 
men in places high and low, so that none, from the President to the lowest border 



THE CRIME AGAINST KANSAS. 169 

postmaster, should decline to be its tool ; all these things and more were needed, 
nnd they were found in the slave power of our Republic. There, sir, stands the 
criminal, all unmasked before you — heartless, grasping, and tyrannical — with 
an audacity beyond that of Verres, a subtlety beyond that of Machiavel, a mean- 
ness beyond that of Bacon, and an ability beyond that of Hastings. Justice to 
Kansas can be secured only by the prostration of this influence ; for this the 
power behind — greater than any President — which succors and sustains the 
crime. Nay, the proceedings I now arraign derive their fearful consequences 
only from this connection. 

In now opening this great matter, I am not insensible to the austere de- 
mands of the occasion ; but the dependence of the crime against Kansas upon 
the slave power is so peculiar and important that I trust to be pardoned while I 
impress it with an illustration, which to some may seem trivial. It is related in 
Northern mythology that the god of Force, visiting an enchanted region, was 
challenged by his royal entertainer to what seemed an humble feat of strength 
— merely, sir, to lift a cat from the ground. The god smiled at the challenge, 
and, calmly placing his hand under the belly of the animal, with superhuman 
strength strove, while the back of the feline monster arched far upward, even 
beyond reach, and one paw actually forsook the earth, until at last the discom- 
fited divinity desisted ; but he was little surprised at his defeat when he learned 
that this creature, which seemed to be a cat, and nothing more, was not merely 
a cat, but that it belonged to and was a part of the great terrestrial serpent, 
which, in its innumerable folds, encircled the whole globe. Even so the creature, 
whose paws are now fastened upon Kansas, whatever it may seem to be, con- 
stitutes in reality a part of the slave power, which, in its loathsome folds, is now 
coiled about the whole land. Thus do I expose the extent of the present con- 
test, where we encounter not merely local resistance, but also the unconquered 
sustaining arm behind. But out of the vastness of the crime attempted, with 
all its woe and shame, I derive a well-founded assurance of a commensurate 
vastness of effort against it by the aroused masses of the country, determined 
not only to vindicate right against wrong, but to redeem the Republic from the 
thraldom of that oligarchy which prompts, directs, and concentrates the distant 
wrong. * * * 

But, before entering upon the argument, I must say something of a general 
character, particularly in response to what has fallen from Senators who have 
raised themselves to eminence on this floor in championship of human wrongs. 
I mean the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. Butler), and the Senator from 
Illinois (Mr. Douglas), who, though unlike as Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, 
yet, like this couple, sally forth together in the same adventure. I regret much 



I/O MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

to miss the elder Senator from his seat; but the cause, against which he has 
run a tilt, with such activity of animosity, demands that the opportunity of expos- 
ing him should not be lost; and it is for the cause that I speak. The Senator 
from South Carolina has read many books of chivalry, and believes himself a 
chivalrous knight, with sentiments of honor and courage. Of course he has 
chosen a mistress to whom he has made his vows, and who, though ugly to 
others, is always lovely to him ; though polluted in the sight of the world, is 
chaste in his sight — I mean the harlot, Slavery. For her, his tongvie is always 
profuse in words. Let her be impeached in character, or any proposition made 
to shut her out from the extension of her wantonness, and no extravagance of 
manner or hardihood of assertion is then too great for this Senator. The frenzy 
of Don Quixote, in behalf of his wench, Dulcinea del Toboso, is all sur- 
passed. The asserted rights of slavery, which shock equality of all kinds, are 
cloaked by a fantastic claim of equality. If the slave States cannot enjoy what, 
in mockery of the great fathers of the Republic, he misnames equality under the 
Constitution — in other words, the full power in the national territories to com- 
pel fellow-men to unpaid toil, to separate husband and wife, and to sell little 
children at the auction block — then, sir, the chivalric Senator will conduct the 
State of South Carolina out of the LTnion ! Heroic knight ! Exalted Senator ! 
A second Moses come for a second exodus ! 

But not content with this poor menace, which we have been twice told was 
" measured," the Senator in the unrestrained chivalry of his nature, has under- 
taken to apply opprobrious words to those who differ from him on this floor. 
He calls them " sectional and fanatical ; " and opposition to the usurpation in 
Kansas he denounces as " an uncalculating fanaticism." To be sure these 
charges lack all grace of originality, and all sentiment of truth ; but the adven- 
turous Senator does not hesitate. He is the uncompromising, unblushing repre- 
sentative on this floor of a flagrant sectionalism, which now domineers over the 
Republic, and yet with a ludicrous ignorance of his own position — unable to see 
himself as others see him — or with an affrontery which even his white head 
ought not to protect from rebuke, he applies to those here who resist his sec- 
tionalism the very epithet which designates himself. The men who strive to 
bring back the Government to its original policy, when freedom and not slavery 
was sectional, he arraigns as sectional. This will not do. It involves too great 
a perversion of terms. I tell that Senator that it is to himself, and to the " organi- 
zation " of which he is the " committed advocate," that this epithet belongs. I 
now fasten it upon them. For myself, I care little for names ; but since the 
question has been raised here, I affirm that the Republican party of the Union 



THE CRIME AGAINST KANSAS. 171 

is in no just sense sectional, but, more than any other party, national; and that it 
now goes forth to dislodge from the high places of the Government the tyran- 
nical sectionalism of which the Senator from South Carolina is one of the 
maddest zealots. * * * 

As the Senator from South Carolina is the Don Quixote, the Senator from 
Illinois (Mr. Douglas) is the squire of slavery, its very Sancho Panza, ready to 
do all its humiliating ofifices. This Senator, in his labored address, vindicating 
his labored report — piling one mass of elaborate error upon another mass — 
constrained himself, as you will remember, to unfamiliar decencies of speech. 
Of that address I have nothing to say at this moment, though before I sit down 
I shall show something of its fallacies. But I go back now to an earlier occasion, 
when, true to his native impulses, he threw into this discussion, " for a charm of 
powerful trouble," personalities most discreditable to this body. I will not stop 
to repel the imputations which he cast upon myself ; but I mention them to re- 
mind you of the " sweltered venom sleeping got," which, with other poisoned 
ingredients, he cast into the caldron of this debate. Of other things I speak. 
Standing on this floor, the Senator issued his rescript, requiring submission to 
the usurped power of Kansas ; and this was accompanied by a manner — all his 
own — such as befits the tyrannical threat. Very well. Let the Senator try. 
I tell him now that he cannot enforce any such submission. The Senator, with 
the slave power at his back, is strong ; but he is not strong enough for this 
purpose. He is bold. He shrinks from nothing. Like Danton, he may cry, 
" I'andacc! raiidace! tonjours Faudacc! " but even his audacity cannot compass 
this work. The Senator copies the British officer who, with boastful swagger, 
said that with the hilt of his sword he would cram the " stamps " down the 
throats of the American people, and he will meet with a similar failure. He may 
convulse this country with a civil feud. Like the ancient madman, he may set 
fire to this temple of constitutional liberty, grander than the Ephesian dome; 
but he cannot enforce obedience to that tyrannical usurpation. 

The Senator dreams that he can subdue the North. He disclaims the open 
threat, but his conduct still implies it. How little that Senator knows himself 
or the strength of the cause which he persecutes ! He is but a mortal man ; 
against him is an immortal principle. With finite power he wrestles with the 
infinite, and he must fall. Against him are stronger battalions than any 
marshaled by mortal arm. — the inborn, ineradicable, invincible sentiments of 
the human heart ; against him is nature in all her subtle forces ; against him 
is God. Let him try to subdue these. * * * 

With regret, I come again upon the Senator from South Carolina (Mr. 
Butler), who, omnipresent in this debate, overflowed with rage at the simple 



172 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

suggestion that Kansas had apphed for admission as a State; and, with inco- 
herent phrases, discharged the loose expectoration of his speech, now upon her 
representative, and then upon her people. There was no extravagance of the 
ancient parliamentary debate, which he did not repeat ; nor was there any pos- 
sible deviation from truth which he did not make, with so much of passion, I 
am glad to add, as to save him from the suspicion of intentional aberration. 
But the Senator touches nothing which he does not disfigure — with error, some- 
times of principle, sometimes of fact. He shows an incapacity of accuracy, 
whether in stating the Constitution, or in stating the law, whether in the details 
of statistics or the diversions of schola,rship. He cannot ope his mouth, but out 
there flies a blunder. Surely he ought to be familiar with the life of Franklin ; 
and yet he referred to this household character, while acting as agent of our 
fathers in England, as above suspicion ; and this was done that he might give 
point to a false contrast with the agent of Kansas — not knowing that, however 
they may differ in genius and fame, in this experience they are alike : that 
Franklin when intrusted with the petition of Massachusetts Bay, was assaulted 
by a foul-mouthed speaker, where he could not be heard in defense, and de- 
nounced as a " thief," even as the agent of Kansas has been assaulted on this 
floor, and denounced as a " forger." And let not the vanity of the Senator be 
inspired by the parallel with the British statesman of that day ; for it is only 
in hostility to freedom that any parallel can be recognized. 

But it is against the people of Kansas that the sensibilities of the Senator 
are particularly aroused. Coming, as he announces, " from a State " — aye, sir, 
from South Carolina — he turns with lordly disgust from this newly-formed 
community, which he will not recognize even as a " body politic." Pray, sir, by 
what title does he indulge in this egotism ? Has he read the history of " the 
State " which he represents ? He cannot surely have forgotten its shameful 
imbecility from slavery, confessed throughout the Revolution, followed by its 
more shameful assumptions for slavery since. He cannot have forgotten its 
wretched persistence in the slave-trade as the very apple of its eye, and the 
condition of its participation in the Union. He cannot have forgotten its Con- 
stitution, which is Republican only in name, confirming power in the hands of 
the few, and founding the qualifications of its legislators on " a settled freehold 
estate and ten negroes." And yet the Senator, to whom that " State " has in 
part committed the guardianship of its good name, instead of moving, with 
backward treading steps, to cover its nakedness, rushes forward in the very 
ecstasy of madness, to expose it by provoking a comparison with Kansas. South 
Carolina is old ; Kansas is young. South Carolina counts by centuries ; where 
Kansas counts by years. But a beneficent example may be born in a day ; and 



THE CRIME AGAINST KANSAS. 173 

I venture to say, that against the two centuries of the older " State," may be 
already set the two years of trial, evolving corresponding virtue, in the younger 
community. In the one, is the long wail of slavery ; in the other, the hymns of 
freedom. And if we glance at special achievements, it will be difficult to find 
anything in the history of South Carolina which presents so much of heroic 
spirit in an heroic cause as appears in that repulse of the Missouri invaders by 
the beleaguered town of Lawrence, where even the women gave their effective 
efforts to freedom. * * * 

Already, in Lawrence alone, there are newspapers and schools, including a 
high school, and throughout this infant Territory there is more mature scholar- 
ship far, in proportion to its inhabitants, than in all South Carolina. Ah, sir, I 
tell the Senator that Kansas, welcomed as a free State, will be a " ministering 
angel " to the Republic, when South Carolina, in the cloak of darkness which 
she hugs, " lies howling." * * * 

To overthrow this usurpation is now the special, importunate duty of 
Congress, admitting of no hesitation or postponement. To this end it must lift 
itself from the cabals of candidates, the machinations of party, and the low level 
of vulgar strife. It must turn from that slave oligarchy which now controls the 
Republic, and refuse to be its tool. Let its power be stretched forth toward this 
distant Territory, not to bind, but to unbind ; not for the oppression of the 
weak, but for the subversion of the tyrannical ; not for the prop and maintenance 
of a revolting Usurpation, but for the confirmation of Liberty. * * * 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, May 19-20, 1856.) 




i;4 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




The Assault Upon Sumner. 



By PRESTON S. BROOKS, of South Carolina. 

(Born 1819, died 1857.) 



R. SPEAKER : Some time since a Senator from Massachusetts al- 
lowed himself, in an elaborately prepared speech, to offer a gross 
insult to my State, and to a venerable friend, who is my State repre- 
sentative, and who was absent at the time. 

Not content with that, he published to the world, and circulated 
extensively, this uncalled-for libel on my State and my blood. What- 
ever insults my State insults me. Her history and character have commanded 
my pious veneration ; and in her defense I hope I shall always be prepared, 
humbly and modestly, to perform the duty of a son. I should have forfeited 
my own self-respect, and perhaps the good opinion of my countrymen, if I had 
failed to resent such an injury by calling the offender in question to a personal 
account. It was a personal affair, and in taking redress into my own hands I 
meant no disrespect to the Senate of the United States or to this House. 
Neither did I design insult or disrespect to the State of Massachusetts. I was 
aware of the personal responsibilities I incurred, and was willing to meet them. 
I knew, too, that I was amenable to the laws of the country, which afford the 
same protection to all, whether they be members of Congress or private citizens. 
I did not, and do not now believe, that I could be properly pvmished, not only 
in a court of law, but here also, at the pleasure and discretion of the House. I 
did not then, and do not now, believe that the spirit of American freemen would 
tolerate slander in high places, and permit a member of Congress to publish 
and circulate a libel on another, and then call upon either House to protect him 
against the personal responsibilities which he had thus incurred. 

But if I had committed a breach of privilege, it was the privilege of the 
Senate, and not of this House, which was violated. I was answerable there, 
and not here. They had no right, as it seems to me, to prosecute me in these 



THE ASSAULT UPON SUMNER. 175 

halls, nor have you the right in law or under the Constitution, as I respect- 
fully submit, to take jurisdiction over offenses committed against them. The 
Constitution does not justify them in making such a request, nor this House 
in granting it. If, unhappily, the day should ever come when sectional or 
party feeling should run so high as to control all other considerations of public 
duty or justice, how easy it will be to use such precedents for the excuse of 
arbitrary power, in either House, to expel members of the minority who may 
have rendered themselves obnoxious to the prevailing spirit in the House to 
which they belong. 

Matters may go smoothly enough when one House asks the other to 
punish a member who is offensive to a majority of its own body; but how will 
it be when, upon a pretense of insulted dignity, demands are made of this House 
to expel a member who happens to run counter to its party predilections, or 
other demands which it may not be so agreeable to grant? It could never have 
been designed by the Constitution of the United States to expose the two 
Houses to such temptations to collision, or to extend so far the discretionary 
power which was given to either House to punish its own members for the 
violation of its rules and orders. Discretion has been said to be the law of the 
tyrant, and when exercised under the color of the law, and under the influence 
of party dictation, it may and will become a terrible and insufferable despotism. 

This House, however, it would seem, from the unmistakable tendency of 
its proceedings, takes a different view from that which I deliberately entertain 
in common with many others. 

So far as public interests or constitutional rights are involved, I have now 
exhausted my means of defense. I may, then, be allowed to take a more per- 
sonal view of the question at issue. The further prosecution of this subject, 
in the shape it has now assumed, may not only involve my friends, but the 
House itself, in agitations which might be unhappy in their consequences to the 
country. If these consequences could be confined to myself individually, I think 
I am prepared and ready to meet them, here or elsewhere ; and when I use this 
language I mean what I say. But others must not suffer for me. I have felt 
more on account of my two friends who have been implicated, than for myself, 
for they have proven that " there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother." 
I will not constrain gentlemen to assume a responsibility on my account, which 
possibly they would not run on their own. 

Sir, I cannot, on my own account, assume the responsibility, in the face of 
the American people, of commencing a line of conduct which in my heart of 



Ly6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

hearts I believe would result in subverting the foundations of this Government, 
and in drenching this hall in blood. No act of mine, on my personal account, 
shall inaugurate revolution ; but v^^hen you, Mr. Speaker, return to your own 
home, and hear the people of the great North — and they are a great people — 
speak of me as a bad man, you will do me the justice to say that a blow struck 
by me at this time would be followed by revolution, and this I know. (Applause 
and hisses in the gallery.) 

Mr. Brooks (resuming) : — If I desired to kill the Senator, why did not I 
do it ? You all admit that I had him in my power. Let me tell the member from 
New Jersey that it was expressly to avoid taking life that I used an ordinary 
cane, presented to me by a friend in Baltimore, nearly three months before its 
application to the " bare head " of the Massachusetts Senator. I went to work 
very deliberately, as I am charged — and this is admitted, — and speculated 
somewhat as to whether I should employ a horsewhip or a cowhide ; but know- 
ing that the Senator was my superior in strength, it occurred to me that he 
might wrest it from my hand, and then — for I never attempt anything I do 
not perform — I might have been compelled to do that which I would have 
regretted the balance of my natural life. 

The question has been asked in certain newspapers, why I did not invite the 
Senator to personal combat in the mode usually adopted. Well, sir, as I desire 
the whole truth to be known about the matter, I will for once notice a news- 
paper article on the floor of the House, and answer here. 

My answer is, that the Senator would not accept a message; and having 
formed the unalterable determination to punish him, I believe that the offense 
of " sending a hostile message," superadded to the indictment for assault and 
battery, would subject me to legal penalties more severe than would be im- 
posed for a simple assault and battery. That is my answer. 

Now, Mr. Speaker, I have nearly finished what I intended to say. If my 
opponents, who have pursued me with unparalleled bitterness, are satisfied with 
the present condition of this affair, I am. I return my thanks to my friends, 
and especially to those who are from non-slave-owning States, who have 
magnanimously sustained me, and felt that it was a higher honor to themselves 
to be just in their judgment of a gentleman than to be a member of Congress 
for lile. In taking my leave, I feel that it is proper that I should say that I 
believe that some of the votes that have been cast against me have been 
extorted by an outside pressure at home, and that their votes do not express 
the feelings or opinions of the members who gave them. 



THE ASSAULT UPON SUMNER. 



177 



To such of these as have given their votes and made their speeches on the 
constitutional principles involved, and without indulging in personal vilification, 
I owe my respect. But, sir, they have written me down upon the history of the 
country as worthy of expulsion, and in no unkindness I must tell them that 
for all future time my self-respect requires that I shall pass them as strangers. 

And now, Mr. Speaker, I announce to you and to this House, that I am 
no longer a member of the Thirty-Fourth Congress. 

(Mr. Brooks then walked out of the House of- Representatives.) 

(Being a speech in the House of Representatives, July 14, 1856, in defense of cowardly conduct.) 



.^ 





178 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Massachusetts and the Sumner Assault. 

By ANSON BURLINGAME, of New York. 

(Born 1820, died 1870.) 

N the 19th of May, it was announced that Mr. Sumner would address 
the Senate upon the Kansas question. The floor of the Senate, the 
galleries, and avenues leading thereto, were thronged with an expect- 
ant audience, and many of us left our places in this House to hear 
the ]\Iassachusetts orator. To say that we were delighted with the 
speech we heard would but faintly express the deep emotions of our 
hearts awakened by it. I need not speak of the classic purity of its language, 
nor of the nobility of its sentiments. It was heard by many ; it has been read 
by millions. There has been no such speech made in the Senate since the days 
when those Titans of American eloquence — the Websters and the Haynes — 
contended with each other for mastery. 

It was severe, because it was launched against tyranny. It was severe, as 
Chatham was severe when he defended the feeble colonies against the giant 
oppression of the mother country. It was made in the face of a hostile Senate. 
It continued through the greater portion of two days ; and yet, during that time, 
the speaker was not once called to order. This fact is conclusive as to the 
personal and parliamentary decorum of the speech. He had provocation enough. 
His State had been called hypocritical. He himself had been called " a puppy," 
" a fool," " a fanatic," and " a dishonest man." Yet he was parliamentary from 
the beginning to the end of his speech. No man knew better than he did the 
proprieties of the place, for he had always observed them. * * * 

On the 22d day of May, when the Senate and the House had clothed them- 
selves in mourning for a brother fallen in the battle of life in the distant State 
of Missouri, the Senator from Massachusetts sat in the silence of the Senate 
Chamber, engaged in the employments pertaining to his office, when a member 
of this House, who had taken an oath to sustain the Constitution, stole into the 
Senate, that place which had hitherto been held sacred against violence, and 
smote him as Cain smote his brother. 

Mr. Keitt (in his seat). — That is false. 

Mr. BuRLiNGAME. — I will not bandy epithets with the gentleman. I am 
responsible for my own language. Doubtless he is responsible for his. 




Anson Burlingame. 



i8o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Mr. Keitt. — I am. 

Mr. BuRLiNGAME. — I shall stand by mine. One blow was enough ; but it 
did not satiate the wrath of that spirit which had pursued him through two 
days. Again and again, quicker and faster fell the leaden blows, until he was 
torn away from his victim, when the Senator from Massachusetts fell in the 
arms of his friends, and his blood ran down on the Senate floor. Sir, the act 
was brief, and my comments on it shall be brief also. I denounce it in the 
name of the Constitution it violated. 1 denounce it in the name of the sover- 
eignty of Massachusetts, which was stricken down by the blow. I denounce it 
in the name of humanity. I denounce it in the name of civilization which it out- 
raged. I denounce it in the name of that fair play which bullies and prize fighters 
respect. What ! strike a man when he is pinioned — when he cannot respond 
to a blow? Call you that chivalry? In what code of honor did you get your 
authority for that? I do not believe that member has a friend so dear who 
must not in his heart of hearts condemn the act. Even the member himself, if 
he has left a spark of that chivalry and gallantry attributed to him, must loathe 
and scorn the act. God knows I do not wish to speak unkindly, or in a spirit 
of revenge ; but I owe it to my manhood and the noble State I, in part, repre- 
sent, to express my abhorrence of the act. But much as I reprobate the act, 
much more do I reprobate the conduct of those who were by and saw the out- 
rage perpetrated. Sir, especially do I notice the conduct of that Senator re- 
cently from the free platform of Massachusetts, with the odor of her hospitality 
on him, who stood there, not only silent and quiet while it was going on, but, 
when it was over, approved the act. And worse ; when he had time to cool, 
when he had slept on it, he went into the Senate Chamber of the United States, 
and shocked the sensibilities of the world by approving it. Another Senator 
did not take part because he feared that his motives might be questioned, ex- 
hibiting as extraordinary a delicacy as that individual who refused to rescue a 
drowning mortal because he had not been introduced to him. Another was 
not on good terms, and yet, if rumor be true, that Senator has declared that 
himself and family are more indebted to Mr. Sumner than to any other man ; 
yet, when he saw him borne bleeding by, he turned and went on the other side. 
Oh, magnanimous Slidell ! Oh, prudent Douglas ! Oh, audacious Toombs ! 

Sir, there are questions arising out of this which far transcend those of a 
mere personal nature. Of those personal considerations I shall speak, when 
the question comes properly before us, if I am permitted to do so. The higher 
question involves the very existence of the Government itself. If, sir, freedom 
of speech is not to remain to us, what is all this Government worth? If we 
from Massachusetts, or any other State — Senators, or members of the House — 



MASSACHUSETTS AND THE SUMNER ASSAULT. i8i 

are to be called to account by some " gallant nephew " of some " gallant uncle," 
when we utter something which does not suit their sensitive natures, we desire 
to know it. If the conflict is to be transferred from this peaceful, intellectual 
field to one where, it is said, " honors are easy and responsibilities equal," then 
we desire to know it. Massachusetts, if her sons and representatives are to 
have the rod held over them, if these things are to continue, the time may come 
— though she utters no threats — when she may be called upon to withdraw 
them to her own bosom, where she can furnish to them that protection which 
is not vouchsafed to them under the flag of their common country. But, while 
she permits us to remain, we shall do our duty, — our whole duty. We shall 
speak whatever we choose to speak, when we will, where we will, and how we 
will, regardless of all consequences. 

Su-s, the sons of Massachusetts are educated at the knees of their mothers, 
in the doctrines of peace and good-will, and, God knows, they desire to culti- 
vate those feelings, — feelings of social kindness and public kindness. The 
House will bear witness that we have not violated or trespassed upon any of 
them ; but, sir. if we are pushed too long and too far, there are men from the 
old commonwealth of Massachusetts who will not shrink from a defense of 
freedom of speech, and the honored State they represent, on any field where 
they may be assailed. 

(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, June 21, 1856.) 




i82 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Irrepressible Conflict. 

By WILLIAM H. SEWARD, of New York. 

(Born 1801, died 1872.) 



lUR country is a theater, which exhibits, in full operation, two radically 
different political systems ; the one resting on the basis of servile or 
slave labor, the other on voluntary labor of freemen. The laborers who 
are enslaved are all negroes, or persons more or less purely of African 
derivation. But this is only accidental. The principle of the system 
is, that labor in every society, by whomsoever performed, is necessarily 
unintellectual, groveling, and base ; and that the laborer, equally for his own 
good and for the welfare of the State, ought to be enslaved. The white laboring 
man, whether native or foreigner, is not enslaved, only because he cannot, as yet, 
be reduced to bondage. 

You need not be told now that the slave system is the older of the two, and 
that once it was universal. The emancipation of our own ancestors, Caucasians 
and Europeans as they were, hardly dates beyond a period of five hundred years. 
The great melioration of human society, which modern times exhibit, is mainly 
due to the incomplete substitution of the system of voluntary labor for the one 
of servile labor, which has already taken place. The African-slave system is 
one which, in its origin and in its growth, has been altogether foreign from the 
habits of the races which colonized these States, and established civilization here. 
It was introduced on this continent as an engine of conquest, and for the estab- 
lishment of monarchical power, by the Portuguese and the Spaniards; and was 
rapidly extended by them all over South America, Central America, Louisiana, 
and Mexico. Its legitimate fruits are seen in the poverty, imbecility, and an- 
archy which now pervade all Portuguese and Spanish America. The free-labor 
system is of German extraction, and it was established in our country by emi- 
grants from Sweden, Holland, Germany. Great Britain, and Ireland. We justly 
ascribe to its influences the strength, wealth, greatness, intelligence, and free- 
dom, which the whole American people now enjoy. One of the chief elements 



THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT. 183 

of the value of human life is freedom in the pursuit of happiness. The slave 
system is not only intolerable, unjust, and inhuman toward the laborer, whom, 
only because he is a laborer, it loads down with chains and converts into mer- 
chandise; but is scarcely less severe upon the freeman, to whom, only because 
he is a laborer from necessity, it denies facilities for employment, and whom it 
expels from the community because it cannot enslave and convert into mer- 
chandise also. It is necessarily improvident and ruinous, because, as a general 
truth, communities prosper and flourish, or droop and decline, in just the degree 
that they practice or neglect to practice the primary duties of justice and human- 
ity. The free-labor system conforms to the divine law of equality, which is writ- 
ten in the hearts and consciences of man, and, therefore, is always and everywhere 
beneficent. 

The slave system is one of constant danger, distrust, suspicion, and watch- 
fulness. It debases those whose toil alone can produce wealth and resources 
for defense, to the lowest degree of which human nature is capable, to guard 
against mutiny and insurrection; and thus wastes energies which otherwise 
might be employed in national development and aggrandizement. 

The free-labor system educates all alike, and, by opening all the fields of 
industrial employment and all the departments of authority to the unchecked 
and equal rivalry of all classes of men, at once secures universal contentment, 
and brings into the highest possible activity all the physical, moral, and social 
energies of the whole State. * * * 

Hitherto, the two systems have existed in different States, but side by side 
within the American Union. This has happened because the Union is a con- 
federation of States. But in another aspect the United States constitute only one 
nation. Increase of population, which is filling the States out to their very 
borders, together with a new and extended net-work of railroads and other 
avenues, and an internal commerce which daily becomes more intimate, is 
rapidly bringing the States into a higher and more perfect social unity or con- 
solidation. Thus, these antagonistic systems are continually coming into closer 
contact, and collision results. 

Shall I tell you what this collision means? They who think that it is acci- 
dental, unnecessary, the work of interested or fanatical agitators, and, therefore, 
ephemeral, mistake the case altogether. It is art irrepressible conflict between 
opposing and enduring forces, and it means that the United States must and 
will, sooner or later, become either entirely a slave-holding nation, or entirely a 
free-labor nation. Either the cotton and rice fields of South Carolina and the 
sugar plantations of Louisiana will ultimately be tilled by free labor, and Charles- 
ton and New Orleans become marts of legitimate merchandise alone; or else 



i84 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

the rye-fields and wheat-fields of Massachusetts and New York must again be 
surrendered by their farmers to slave culture and to the production of slaves, 
and Boston and New York become once more markets for trade in the bodies 
and souls of men. It is the failure to apprehend this great truth that induces 
so many unsuccessful attempts at final compromises between the slave and free 
States, and it is the existence of this great fact that renders all such pretended 
compromises, when made, vain and ephemeral. Startling as this saying may 
appear to you, fellow citizens, it is by no means an original or even a modern 
one. Our forefathers knew it to be true, and unanimously acted upon it when 
they framed the Constitution of the United States. They regarded the existence 
of the servile system in so many of the States with sorrow and shame, which 
they openly confessed, and they looked upon the collision between them, which 
v;as then just revealing itself, and which we are now accustomed to deplore, with 
favor and hope. They knew that one or the other system must exclusively 
prevail. 

Unlike too many of those who in modern time invoke their authority, they 
had a choice between the two. They preferred the system of free labor, and 
they determined to organize the Government, and so direct its activity, that that 
system should surely and certainly prevail. For this purpose, and no other, 
they based the whole structure of the Government broadly on the principle that 
all men are created equal, and, therefore, free — little dreaming that, within the 
short period of one hundred years, their descendants would bear to be told by 
any orator, however popular, that the utterance of that principle was merely a 
rhetorical rhapsody ; or by any judge, however venerated, that it was attended 
by mental reservation, which rendered it hypocritical and false. By the ordi- 
nance of 1787, they dedicated all of the national domain, not yet polluted by 
slavery, to free labor immediately, thenceforth and forever; vhile by the new 
Constitution and laws they invited foreign free labor from all lands under the 
sun, and interdicted the importation of African-slave labor, at all times, in all 
places, and under all circumstances whatsoever. It is true that they necessarily 
and wisely modified this policy of freedom by leaving it to the several States, 
att'ected as they were by different circumstances, to abolish slavery in their own 
way and at their own pleasure, instead of confiding that duty to Congress ; and 
that they secured to the slave States, while yet retaining the system of slavery, 
a three-fifths representation of slaves in the Federal Government, until they 
should find themselves able to relinquish it with safety. But the very nature of 
these modifications fortifies my position, that the fathers knew that the two 
systems could not endure within the Union, and expected within a short period 
slavery would disappejir forever. Moreover, in order that these modifications 



THE IRREPRESSIBLE CONFLICT. 185 

might not altogether defeat their grand design of a republic maintaining uni- 
versal equality, they provided that two-thirds of the States might amend the 
Constitution. 

It remains to say on this point only one word, to guard against misappre- 
hension. If these States are to again become universally slave-holding, I do not 
pretend to say with what violations of the Constitution that end shall be accom- 
plished. On the other hand, while I do confidently believe and hope that my 
country will yet become a land of universal freedom, I do not expect that it will 
be made so otherwise than through the action of the several States co-operating 
with the Federal Government, and all acting in strict conformity with their re- 
spective Constitutions. 

The strife and contentions concerning slavery, which gently-disposed per- 
sons so habitually deprecate, are nothing more than the ripening of the conflict 
which the fathers themselves not only thus regarded with favor, but which they 
may be said to have instituted. 

* * * I know — few, I think, know better than I — the resources and 
energies of the Democratic party, which is identical with the slave power. I 
do ample justice to its traditional popularity. I know further — few, I think> 
know better than I ■ — the difficulties and disadvantages of organizing a new 
political force, like the Republican party, and the obstacles it must encounter in 
laboring without prestige and without patronage. But, understanding all this, 
1 know that the Democratic party must go down, and that the Republican party 
must rise into its place. The Democratic party derived its strength, originally, 
from its adoption of the principles of equal and exact justice to all men. So 
long as it practised this principle faithfully, it was invulnerable. It became 
vulnerable when it renounced the principle; and since that time it has maintained 
itself, not by virtue of its own strength, or even of its traditional merits, but 
because there as yet had appeared in the political field no other party that had 
the conscience and the courage to take up and avow and practice the life- 
inspiring principle which the Democratic party had surrendered. At last, the 
Republican party has appeared. It avows, now, as the Republican party of 1800 
did, in one word, its faith and its works, " Equal and exact justice to all men." 
Even when it first entered the field, only half-organized, it struck a blow which 
only just failed to secure complete and triumphant victory. In this, its second 
campaign, it has already won advantages which render that triumph now both 
easy and certain. 

The secret of its assured success lies in that very characteristic which, in 
the mouth of scofifers, constitutes its great and lasting imbecility and reproach. 
It lies in the fact that it is a party of one idea ; but that is a noble one — an 



i86 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



idea that fills and expands all generous souls — the idea of equality — the equality 
of all men before human tribunals and human laws, as they all are equal before 
the divine tribunal and divine laws. 

I know, and you know, that a revolution has begun. I know, and all the 
world knows, that revolutions never go backward. Twenty Senators and a 
hundred Representatives proclaim boldly in Congress to-day sentiments and 
opinions and principles of freedom which hardly so many men, even in this 
free State, dared to utter in their own homes twenty years ago. While the 
Government of the United States, under the conduct of the Democratic party, 
has been all that time surrendering one plain and castle after another to slavery, 
the people of the United States have been no less steadily and perseveringly 
gathering together the forces with which to recover back again all the fields and 
all the castles which have been lost, and to confound and overthrow, by one 
decisive blow, the betrayers of the Constitution and freedom forever. 

(Delivered at Rochester, October 25, 1858.) 







THE VOICE OF PROPHECY. 187 



The Voice of Prophecy, 

By ABRAHAM LINCOLN, of Illinois. 

(Born 1809, died 1865.) 




R. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN! OF THE CONVENTION : 
If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we 
could better judge what to do, and how to do it. We are now far 
into the fifth year since a policy was initiated with the avowed object, 
and confident promise, of putting an end to slavery agitation. Under 
the operation of that policy, that agitation not only has not ceased, 
but has constantly augmented. In my opinion, it will not cease until a crisis 
shall have been reached and passed. "A house divided against itself cannot 
stand." I believe this Government cannot endure permanently half slave and 
half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved ; I do not expect the house 
to fall ; but I do expect that it will cease to be divided. It will become all one 
thing, or all the other. Either the opponents of slavery will arrest the further 
spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it 
is in the course of ultimate extinction ; or its advocates will push it forward till 
it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well 
as South. Have we no tendency to the latter condition? Let anyone who 
doubts carefully contemplate that now almost complete legal combination piece 
of machinery, so to speak — compounded of the Nebraska doctrine and the Dred 
Scott decision. Let him consider not only what work the machinery is adapted 
to do, and how well adapted, but also let him study the history of its construc- 
tion, and trace, if he can, or rather fail, if he can, to trace the evidences of design 
and concert of action among its chief architects from the beginning. 

The new year of 1854 found slavery excluded from more than half the 
States by State Constitutions, and from most of the national territory by con- 
gressional prohibition. Four days later commenced the struggle which ended 
in repealing that congressional prohibition. This opened all the national ter- 
ritory to slavery, and was the first point gained. But, so far. Congress only 
had acted, and an indorsement, by the people, real or apparent, was indispensable, 
to save the point already gained and give chance for more. This necessity had 




Abraham Lincoln, 



THE VOICE OF PROPHECY. 189 

not been overlooked, but had been provided for, as well as might be, in the 
notable argument of " squatter sovereignty," otherwise called " sacred right of 
self-government; " — which latter phrase, though expressive of the only rightful 
basis of any government, was so perverted in this attempted use of it as to 
amount to just this : That, if any one man choose to enslave another, no third 
man shall be allowed to object. That argument was incorporated with the 
Nebraska bill itself, in the language which follows : " It being the true intent 
and meaning of this act, not to legislate slavery into any Territory or State, nor 
to exclude it therefrom; but to leave the people thereof perfectly free to form 
and regulate their domestic institutions in their own way, subject only to the 
Constitution of the United States." Then opened the roar of loose declamation 
in favor of " squatter sovereignty," and " sacred right of self-government." 
" But," said opposition members, " let us amend the bill so as to expressly 
declare that the people of the Territory may exclude slavery." " Not we," said 
the friends of the measure ; and down they voted the amendment. 

While the Nebraska bill was passing through Congress, a law case, involv- 
ing the question of a negro's freedom, by reason of his owner having volun- 
tarily taken him first into a free State, and then into a Territory covered by the 
congressional prohibition, and held him as a slave for a long time in each, was 
passing through the United States Circuit Court for the District of Missouri ; 
and both Nebraska bill and lawsuit were brought to a decision in the same 
month of May, 1854. The negro's name was Dred Scott, which name now 
designates the decision finally made in the case. Before the then next Presi- 
dential election, the law case came to, and was argued in, the Supreme Court of 
the United States ; but the decision of it was deferred until after the election. 
Still, before the election, Senator Trumbull, on the floor of the Senate, requested 
the leading advocate of the Nebraska bill to state his opinion whether the people 
of a Territory can constitutionally exclude slavery from their limits ; and the 
latter answers : " That is a question for the Supreme Court." 

The election came, Mr. Buchanan was elected, and the indorsement, such 
as it was, secured. That was the second point gained. The indorsement, how- 
ever, fell short of a clear popular majority by nearly four hundred thousand 
votes, and so, perhaps, was not overwhelmingly reliable and satisfactory. The 
outgoing President, in his last annual message, as impressively as possible, 
echoed back upon the people the weight and authority of the indorsement. The 
Supreme Court met again, did not announce their decision, but ordered a re- 
argument. The presidential inauguration came, and still no decision of the 
court ; but the incoming President, in his inaugural address, fervently exhorted 
the people to abide by the forthcoming decision, whatever it might be. Then, 



T90 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



in a few days, came the decision. The reputed author of the Nebraska bill finds 
an early occasion to make a speech at this capital, indorsing the Dred 
Scott decision^ and vehemently denouncing all opposition to it. The new Presi- 
dent, too, seizes the early occasion of the Silliman letter to indorse and strongly 
construe that decision, and to express his astonishment that any different view 
had ever been entertained. * * * 

(Being part of a speech on his nomination to the United States Senate, at the Republican State Con- 
vention, Springfield, Illinois, June i6, 1858.) 




SECESSION AND THE STATE OF THE UNION. 191 




Secession and the State of the Union. 

By BENJAMIN F. WADE, of Ohio. 

(Born 1800, died 1878.) 



lENTLEMEN, it will be very well for us all to take a view 
of all the phases of this controversy before we come to such 
conclusions as seem to have been arrived at in some quarters. I 
make the assertion here that I do not believe, in the history of the 
world, there ever was a nation or a people where a law repugnant 
to the general feeling was ever executed with the same faithfulness 
as has been your most savage and atrocious Fugitive bill, in the North. You 
yourselves can scarcely point out any case that has come before any Northern 
tribunal in which the law has not been enforced to the very letter. You ought 
to know these facts, and you do know them. You all know that when a law 
is passed anywhere to bind any people, who feel, in conscience, or for any other 
reason, opposed to its execution, it is not in human nature to enforce it with 
the same certainty as a law that meets with the approbation of the great mass 
of the citizens. Every rational man understands this, and every candid man 
will admit it. Therefore it is that I do not violently impeach you for your 
unfaithfulness in the execution of many of your laws. You have, in South 
Carolina, a law by which you take free citizens of Massachusetts or any other 
maritime State, who visit the city of Charleston, and lock them up in jail under 
the penalty, if they cannot pay the jail fees, of eternal slavery staring them in the 
face — a monstrous law, revolting to the best feelings of humanity and violently 
in conflict with the Constitution of the United States. I do not say this by way 
of recrimination ; for the excitement pervading the country is now so great that 
I do not wish to add a single coal to the flame; but, nevertheless, I wish the 
whole truth to appear * * * 

Now, Mr. President, I have shown, I think, that the dominant majority 
here have nothing to complain of in the legislation of Congress, or in the legis- 
lation of any of the States, or in the practice of the people of the North, under 



192 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

the Fugitive Slave bill, except so far as they say certain State legislation fur- 
nishes some evidence of hostility to their institutions. And here, sir, I beg 
to make an observation. I tell the Senator, and I tell all the Senators, 
that the Republican party of the Northern States, so far as I know, and 
of my own State in particular, hold the same opinions with regard to this 
peculiar institution of yours that are held by all the civilized nations of 
the world. We do not differ from the public sentiment of England, of 
France, of Germany, of Italy, and every other civilized nation on God's earth ; 
and I tell you frankly that you never found, and you never will find, a free 
comnmnity that are in love with your peculiar institution. The Senator from 
Texas (Mr. Wigfall) told us the other day that cotton was king, and that by 
its influence it would govern all creation. He did not say so in words, but that 
was the substance of his remark : that cotton was king, and that it had its 
subjects in Europe, who dared not rebel against it. Here let me say to that 
Senator, in passing, that it turns out that they are very rebellious subjects, and 
they are talking very disrespectfully at present of that king that he spoke of. 
They defy you to exercise your power over them. They tell you that they 
sympathize in this controversy with what you call the Black Republicans. There- 
fore, I hope that, so far as Europe is concerned at least, we shall hear no more 
of this boast that cotton is king; and that he is going to rule all the civilized 
nations of the world, and bring them to his footstool. Sir, it will never be 
done. 

But, sir, I wish to inquire whether the Southern people are injured by, or 
have any just right to complain of, that platform of principles that we put out, 
and on which we have elected a President and Vice-President. I have no 
concealments to make, and I shall talk to you, my Southern friends, precisely 
as I would talk upon the stump on the subject. I tell you that in that platform 
we did lay it down that we would, if we had the power, prohibit slavery from 
another inch of free territory under this Government. I stand on that position 
to-day. I have argued it probably to half a million people. They stand there, 
and have commissioned and enjoined me to stand there forever ; and, so help 
me God, I will. I say to you frankly, gentlemen, that while we hold this doc- 
trine, there is no Republican, there is no convention of Republicans, there is no 
paper that speaks for them, there is no orator that sets forth their doctrines, who 
ever pretends that they have any right in your States to interfere with your 
peculiar institution ; but, on the other hand, our authoritative platform repu- 
diates the idea that we have any right or any intention ever to invade your 
peculiar institution in your own States. 




Benjamin F. Wade. 



194 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Now, what do you complain of? You are going to break up this Govern- 
ment; you are going to involve us in war and blood, from a mere suspicion 
that we shall justify that which we stand everywhere pledged not to do. Would 
you be justified in the eyes of the civilized world in taking so monstrous a 
position, and predicating it on a bare, groundless suspicion? We do not love 
slavery. Did you not know that before to-day, before this session commenced ? 
Have you not a perfect confidence that the civilized world is against you on 
this subject of loving slavery or believing that it is the best institution in the 
world? Why, sir, everything remains precisely as it was a year ago. No 
great catastrophe has occurred. There is no recent occasion to accuse us of 
anything. But all at once, when we meet here, a kind of gloom pervades the 
whole community and the Senate Chamber. Gentlemen rise and tell us that 
they are on the eve of breaking up this Government, that seven or eight States 
are going to break off their connection with the Government, retire from the 
Union, and set up a hostile Government of their own; and they look imploringly 
over to us and say to us : " You can prevent it ; we can do nothing to prevent 
it; but it all lies with you." Well, sir, what can we do to prevent it? You have 
not even condescended to tell us what you want ; but I think I see through the 
speeches that I have heard from gentlemen on the other side. If we would 
give up the verdict of the people and take your platform, I do not know but 
you would be satisfied with it. * * * 

It is not, then, that Mr. Lincoln is expected to do any overt act by which 
you may be injured; you will not wait for any; but anticipating that the Govern- 
ment may work an injury, you say you will put an end to it; which means, 
simply, that you intend either to rule or ruin this Government. That is what 
your complaint comes to ; nothing else. We do not like your institution, you 
say. Well, we never liked it any better than we do now. You might as well 
have dissolved the Union at any other period as now, on that account, for we 
stand in relation to it precisely as we have ever stood ; that is, repudiating it 
among ourselves as a matter of policy and morals, but nevertheless admitting 
that where it is out of our jurisdiction, we have no hold upon it, and no designs 
upon it. 

Then, sir, as there is nothing in the platform on which I\Ir. Lincoln was 
elected of which you complain, I ask, is there anything in the character of the 
President-elect of which you ought to complain? Has he not lived a blameless 
life? Did he ever transgress any law? Has he ever committed any violation 
of duty of which the most scrupulous can complain? Why, then, your suspi- 
cions that he will? I have shown that you have had the Government all the 
time, until, by some misfortune or maladministration, you brought it to the 



SECESSION AND THE STATE OF THE UNION. 195 

very verge of destruction, and the wisdom of the people had discovered that 
it was high time that the scepter should depart from you and be placed in 
more competent hands; I say, that this being so, you have no constitutional 
right to complain, especially when we disavow any intention so to make use of 
the victory we have won as to injure you at all. 

This brings me, sir, to the question of compromises. On the first day 
of this session, a Senator rose in his place and offered a resolution for the 
appointment of a committee to inquire into the evils that exist between the 
different sections, and to ascertain what can be done to settle this great diffi- 
culty. That is the proposition substantially, I tell the Senator that I know of 
no difficulty, and as to compromises, I had supposed that we were all agreed 
that the day of compromises was at an end. The most solemn compromises we 
have ever made have been violated without a " whereas." Since I have had a 
seat in this body, one of considerable antiquity, that had stood for more than 
thirty years, was swept away from your statute-books. When I stood here 
in the minority arguing against it ; when I asked you to withhold your hand ; 
when I told you it was a sacred compromise between the sections, and that 
when it was removed we should be brought face to face with all that sectional 
bitterness that has intervened ; when I told you that it was a sacred compro- 
mise which no man should touch with his finger, what was your reply? That 
it was a mere act of Congress — nothing more, nothing less — and that it could 
be swept away by the same majority that passed it. That was true in point 
of fact, and true in point of law ; but it showed the weakness of compromises. 
Now, sir, I only speak for myself; and I say that, in view of the manner in 
which other compromises have been heretofore treated, I should hardly think 
any two of the Democratic party would look each other in the face and say 
" compromise " without a smile. (Laughter.) A compromise to be brought 
about by act of Congress, after the experience we have had, is absolutely 
ridiculous. * * * 

I say, then, that, so far as I am concerned, I will yield to no compromise. 
I do not come here begging, either. It would be an indignity to the people 
that I represent, if I were to stand here parleying as to the rights of the party to 
which I belong. We have won our right to the Chief Magistracy of this nation 
in the way that you have always won your predominance ; and if you are as 
willing to do justice to others as to exact it from them, you would never raise 
an inquiry as to a committee for compromises. Here I beg, barely for myself, 
to say one thing more. Many of you stand in an attitude hostile to this Govern- 
ment ; that is to say, you occupy an attitude where you threaten that, unless 
we do so and so, you will go out of this Union and destroy the Government. 



196 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

I say to you for myself, that, in my private capacity, I never yielded to anything 
by way of threat, and, in my public capacity, I have no right to yield to any such 
thing; and, therefore, I would not entertain a proposition for any compromise; 
for, in my judgment, this long, chronic controversy that has existed between 
us must be met, and met upon the principles of the Constitution and by-laws, 
and met now. I hope it may be adjusted to the satisfaction of all ; and I know 
no other way to adjust it, except that way which is laid down by the Constitu- 
tion of the United States. Whenever we go astray from that, we are sure to 
plunge ourselves into difficulties. The old Constitution of the United States, 
although commonly and frequently in direct opposition to what I could wish, 
nevertheless, in my judgment, is the wisest and best Constitution that ever yet 
organized a free government; and by its provisions I am willing and intend to 
stand or fall. Like the Senator from ]Mississippi, I ask nothing more. I ask no 
ingrafting upon it. I ask nothing to be taken away from it. Under its provisions 
a nation has grown faster than any other in the history of the world ever did 
before, in prosperity, in power, and in all that makes a nation great and glorious. 
It has ministered to the advantages of this people ; and now I am unwilling 
to add or take away anything, till I can see much clearer than I can now that 
it wants either any addition or lopping ofif. * * * 

The Senator from Texas says — it is not exactly his language — we will 
force you to an ignominious treaty up in Faneuil Hall. Well, sir. you may. We 
know you are brave ; we understand }'our prowess ; we want no fight with you ; 
but, nevertheless, if you drive us to that necessity, we must use all the powers 
of this Government to maintain it intact in its integrity. If we are overthrown, 
we but share the fate of a thousand other Governments that have been subverted. 
If you are the weakest, then }Ou must go to the wall; and that is all there 
is about it. That is the condition in which we stand, provided a State sets 
herself up in opposition to the General Government. 

I say that is the way it seems to me, as a lawyer. I sec no power in the 
Constitution to release a Senator from this position. Sir, if there was any 
other, if there was an absolute right of secession in the Constitution of the 
L^nited States, when we stepped up there to take our oath of office, why was 
there not an exception in that oath? W'hy did it not run "that we would 
support the Constitution of the United States, unless our State shall secede 
before our term was out?" Sir, there is no such immunity. There is no way 
by which this can be done that I can conceive of, except it is standing upon the 
Constitution of the L^nited States, demanding ec|ual justice for all, and vindi- 
cating the old flag of the Union. We must maintain it, unless we are cloven 
down by superior force. 



SECESSION AND THE STATE OF THE UNION. 197 

Well, sir, it may happen that you can make your way out of the Union, 
and that, by levying war upon the Government, you may vindicate your right to 
independence. If you should do so, I have a policy in my mind. No man would 
regret more than myself that any portion of the people of these United States 
should think themselves impelled, by grievances or anything else, to depart 
out of this Union and raise a foreign flag and a hand against the General Govern- 
ment. If there was any just cause on God's earth that I could see that was 
within my reach of honorable release from any such pretended grievance, they 
should have it ; but they set forth none ; I can see none. It is all a matter of 
prejudice, superinduced unfortunately, I believe, as I intimated before, more 
because you have listened to the enemies of the Republican party and what 
they said of us; while, from your intolerance, you have shut out all light as to 
what our real principles are. We have been called and branded in the North 
and in the South and everywhere else, as John Brown men, as men hostile to 
your institutions, as meditating an attack upon your institutions in your own 
States — a thing that no Republican ever dreamed of or ever thought of, but 
has protested against as often as the question has been up ; but your people 
believe it. No doubt they believe it because of the terrible excitement and reign 
of terror that prevails there. No doubt they think so, but it arises from false 
information, or the want of information — that is all. Their prejudices have 
been appealed to until they have become uncontrolled and uncontrollable. 

Well, sir, if it shall be so ; if that " glorious Union," as we call it, under 
which the Government has so long lived and prospered, is now about to come 
to a final end, as perhaps it may, I have been looking around to see what policy 
we should adopt ; and through that gloom, which has been mentioned on the 
other side, if you will have it so, I still see a glorious future for those who 
stand by the old flag of the nation. * * * 

But, sir, I am for maintaining the Union of these States. I will sacrifice 
everything but honor to maintain it. That glorious old flag of ours, by any 
act of mine, shall never cease to wave over the integrity of this Union as it 
is. Bvit if they will not have it so, in this new, renovated Government of which 
I have spoken, the Fourth of July, with all its glorious memories, will never be 
repealed. The old flag of 1776 will be in our hands, and shall float over this 
nation forever; and this Capitol, that some gentlemen said would be reserved for 
the Southern Republic, shall still be the Capitol. It was laid out by Washington ; 
it was consecrated by him ; and the old flag that he vindicated in the Revolution 
shall still float from the Capitol. 

I say, sir, I stand by the Union of these States. Washington and his com- 
patriots fought for that good old flag. It shall never be hauled down, but shall 



198 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



be the glory of the Government to which I belong, as long as my life shall con- 
tinue. To maintain it, Washington and his compatriots fought for liberty and 
the rights of man. And here I will add that my own father, although but a 
humble soldier, fought in the same great cause, and went through hardships and 
privations sevenfold worse than death, in order to bequeath it to his children. 
It is my inheritance. It was my protector in infancy, and the pride and glory 
of my riper years ; and, Mr. President, although it may be assailed by traitors 
on every side, by the grace of God. under its shadow I will die. 

(Delivered in the Senate of the United States, December 17, i860.) 





SECESSION. 199 



Secession. 

By ALFRED IVERSON, of Georgia. 

(Born 1798, died 1874.) 



DO not rise, Mr. President, for the purpose of entering at any length 
into this discussion, or to defend the President's message, which has 
been attacked by the Senator from New Hampshire. I am not the 
mouthpiece of the President. While I do not agree with some por- 
tions of the message, and some of the positions that have been taken 
by the President, I do not perceive all the inconsistencies in that docu- 
ment which the Senator from New Hampshire has thought proper to present. 

It is true, that the President denies the constitutional right of a State to 
secede from the Union ; while, at the same time, he also states that this Federal 
Government has no constitutional right to enforce or to coerce a State back 
into the Union, which may take upon itself the responsibility of secession. I do 
not see any inconsistency in that. The President may be right when he asserts 
the fact that no State has a constitutional right to secede from the Union. 
I do not myself place the right of a State to secede from the Union upon consti- 
tutional grounds. I admit that the Constitution has not granted that power to 
a State. It is exceedingly doubtful, even, whether the right has been reserved. 
Certainly it has not been reserved in express terms. I, therefore, do not place 
the expected action of any of the Southern States, in the present contingency, 
upon the constitutional right of secession ; and I am not prepared to dispute, 
therefore, the position which the President has taken upon that point. 

I rather agree with the President that the secession of a State is an act of 
revolution taken through that particular means or by that particular measure. 
It withdraws from the Federal compact, disclaims any further allegiance to it, 
and sets itself up as a separate Government, an independent State. The State 
does it at its peril, of course, because it may or may not be cause of war by the 
remaining States composing the Federal Government. If they think proper to 
consider it such an act of disobedience, or if they consider that the policy of 
the Federal Government be such that it cannot submit to this dismemberment, 
why, then they may or may not make war, if they choose, upon the seceding 



200 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

States. It will be a question, of course, for the Federal Government or the 
remaining States to decide for themselves, whether they will permit a State to 
go out of the Union, and remain as a separate and independent State, or 
whether they will attempt to force her back at the point of the bayonet. That 
is a question, I presume, of policy and expediency, which will be considered by 
the remaining States composing the Federal Government, through their organ, 
the Federal Government, whenever the contingency arises. 

But, sir, while a State has no power, under the Constitution, conferred upon 
it to secede from the Federal Government or from the Union, each State has the 
right of revolution, which all admit. Whenever the burdens of the Government 
under which it acts become so onerous That it cannot bear them, or if anticipated 
evil shall be so great that the State believes it would be better off — even risk- 
ing the perils of secession — out of the Union than in it ; then that State, in my 
opinion, like all people upon earth, has the right to exercise the great funda- 
mental principle of self-preservation, and go out of the Union — though, of 
course, at its own peril — and bear the risk of the consequences. And while no 
State may have the constitutional right to secede from the Union, the President 
may not be wrong when he says the Federal Government has no power under 
the Constitution to compel the State to come back into the Union. It may be 
a casus omissus in the Constitution ; but I should like to know where the power 
exists in the Constitution of the United States to authorize the Federal Govern- 
ment to coerce a sovereign State. It does not exist in terms, at any rate, in the 
Constitution. I do not think there is any inconsistency, therefore, between the 
two positions of the President in the message, upon these particular points. 

The only fault I have to find with the message of the President is the incon- 
sistency of another portion. He declares that, as the States have no power 
to secede, the Federal Government is in fact a consolidated government; that 
it is not a voluntary association of States. I deny it. It was a voluntary associ- 
ation of States. No State was ever forced to come into the Federal Union. 
Every State came voluntarily into it. It was an association, a voluntary asso- 
ciation of States ; and the President's position that it is not a voluntary associa- 
tion is, in my opinion, altogether wrong. 

But whether that be so or not, the President declares and assumes that this 
Government is a consolidated government to this extent: that all the laws of 
the Federal Government are to operate directly upon each individual of the 
States, if not upon the States themselves, and must be enforced; and yet, at 
the same time, he says that the State which secedes is not to be coerced. He 
says that the laws of the United States must be enforced against every individual 
of a State. 




Alfred Iverson. 



202 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Of course, the State is composed of individuals within its Hmits, and if 
you enforce the laws and obligations of the Federal Government against each 
and every individual of the State, you enforce them against a State. While, 
therefore, he says that a State is not to be coerced, he declares, in the same 
breath, his determination to enforce the laws of the Union, and, therefore, to 
coerce the State if a State goes out. There is the inconsistency, according to my 
idea, which I do not see how the President or anybody else can reconcile. 
That the Federal Government is to enforce its laws over the seceding State, and 
yet not coerce her into obedience, is to me incomprehensible. 

But I did not rise, Mr. President, to discuss these questions in relation 
to the message ; I rose in behalf of the State that I represent, as well as other 
Southern States that are engaged in this movement, to accept the issue which the 
Senator from New Hampshire has seen fit to tender; that is — of zvar! Sir, the 
Southern States now moving in this matter are not doing it without due consid- 
eration. We have looked over the whole field. We believe that the only secu- 
rity for the institution to which we attach so much importance, is secession and 
a Southern Confederacy. We are satisfied, notwithstanding the disclaimers 
upon the part of the Black Republicans to the contrary, that they intend to use 
the Federal power, when they get possession of it, to put down and extinguish 
the institution of slavery in the Southern States. I do not intend to enter upon 
the discussion of that point. That, however, is my opinion. It is the opinion 
of a large majority of those with whom I associate at home, and I believe of 
the Southern people. Believing that this is the intention and object, the ulti- 
mate aim and design, of the Republican party, the Abolitionists of the North, 
we do not intend to stay in this Union until we shall become so weak that we 
shall not be able to resist, when the time comes for resistance. Our true policy 
is the one which we have made up our minds to follow. Our true policy is to 
go out of this Union now, while we have strength to resist any attempt on the 
part of the Federal Government to coerce us. * * * 

We intend, Mr. President, to go out peaceably if we can, forcibly if we 
must ; but I do not believe, with the Senator from New Hampshire, that there 
is going to be any war. If five or eight States go out, they will necessarily 
draw all the other Southern States after them. That is a consequence that 
nothing can prevent. If five or eight States go out of this Union, I should like 
to see the man that would propose a declaration of war against them, or attempt 
to force them into obedience to the Federal Government at the point of the 
bayonet or the sword. 

Sir, there has been a good deal of vaporing on this subject. A great many 
threats have been thrown out. I have heard them on this floor, and upon the 



SECESSION. 203 

floor of the other House of Congress ; but I have also perceived this : they come 
from those who would be the very last men to attempt to put their threats into 
execution. Men talk sometimes about their eighteen millions who are to whip 
us ; and yet we have heard of cases in which just such men had sulTered them- 
selves to be switched in the face, and trembled like sheep-stealing dogs, expect- 
ing to be shot every minute. These threats generally come from n>en who 
would be the last to execute them. Some of these Northern editors talk about 
whipping the Southern States like spaniels. Brave words ; but I venture to as- 
sert none of those men would ever volunteer to command an army to be sent 
down South to coerce us into obedience to Federal power. * * * 

But, sir, I apprehend that when we go out and form our Confederacy — 
as I think and hope we shall do very shortly — the Northern States, or the Fed- 
eral Government, will see its true policy to be to let us go in peace and make 
treaties of commerce and amity with us, from which they will derive more 
advantages than from any attempt to coerce us. They cannot succeed in coerc- 
ing us. If they allow us to form our Government without difhculty, we shall 
be very willing to look upon them as a favored nation, and give them all the 
advantages of commercial and amicable treaties. I have no doubt that both of 
us — certainly the Southern States — would live better, more happily, more 
prosperously, and with greater friendship, than we live now in this Union. 

Sir, disguise the fact as you will, there is an enmity between the Northern 
and Southern people that is deep and enduring, and you never can eradicate it — 
never! Look at the spectacle exhibited on this floor. How is it? There are 
the RepubHcan Northern Senators upon that side. Here are the Southern Sen- 
ators on this side. How much social intercourse is there between us ? You sit 
upon your side, silent and gloomy; we sit upon ours, with knit brows and por- 
tentous scowls. Yesterday, I observed that there was not a solitary man on that 
side of the Chamber came over here, even to extend the civilities and courtesies 
of life; nor did any of us go over there. Here are two hostile bodies on this 
floor; and it is but a type of the feeling that exists between the two sections. 
We are enemies as much as if we were hostile States. I believe that the North- 
ern people hate the South worse than ever the English people hated France ; 
and I can tell my brethren over there, that there is no love lost upon the part of 
the South. 

In this state of feeling- — divided as we are by interest, by a geographical 
feeling, by everything that makes two people separate and distinct — I ask why 
we should remain in the same Union together? We have not lived in peace; we 
are not now living in peace. It is not expected or hoped that we shall ever live 
in peace. My doctrine is that whenever even man and wife find that they must 



204 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



quarrel, and cannot live in peace, they ought to separate ; and these two sec- 
tions — ■ the North and South — manifesting, as they have done and do now 
and probably will ever manifest, feelings of hostility, separated as they are in 
interests and objects, my own opinion is they can never live in peace; and the 
sooner they separate, the better. 

Sir, these sentiments I have thrown out crudely, I confess, and upon the 
spur of the occasion. I should not have opened my mouth but that the 
Senator from New Hampshire seemed to show a spirit of bravado, as if he 
intended to alarm and scare the Southern States into a retreat from their move- 
ments. He says that war is to come, and you had better take care, therefore. 
That is the purport of his language ; of course, those are not his words ; but 
I understand him very well, and everybody else, I apprehend, understands him 
that war is threatened, and, therefore, the South had better look out. Sir, I do 
not believe that there will be any war ; but if war is to come, let it come. We 
will meet the Senator from New Hampshire and all the myrmidons of Abolition- 
ism and Black Republicanism everywhere, upon our own soil; and, in the Ian 
guage of a distinguished member from Ohio, in relation to the Mexican War, 
we will " welcome you with bloody hands to hospitable graves." 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, December 5, i860.) 








THE DEATH OF DOUGLAS. ^05 



The Death of Douglas. 

By LYMAN TRUMBULL, of Connecticut. 

(Born 1813, died 1896.) 



E was three times elected by the people to the House of Representatives, 
and thrice by the Legislature of his State to a seat in this body, and 
was continuously a member of one House or the other, from his first 
entry, in 1843, till his death, four years of his last senatorial term still 
remaining unexpired. From this brief history, it appears that Judge 
Douglas devoted more than half his life, and all the years of his 
manhood, to the public service ; and so prominent was the part he took in public 
affairs, so intimate the connection between his own rise and fame, and the 
progress and renown of his State and the nation, that the history of the one 
would be incomplete without that of the other. No great public movement has 
taken place since he entered public life which has not felt the influence of his 
will and his intellect; perhaps no one man, since the Government began, ever 
exercised a greater influence over the masses of the people than he. No one 
ever gathered around him more devoted followers or more enthusiastic ad- 
mirers, who were willing to do and dare more for another, than were his friends 
for him. 

What this charm was which so linked the popular heart to him that it never 
faltered even under circumstances apparently the most discouraging, seems 
almost mysterious. This feeling of attachment followed him to the grave, and 
was never more manifest than after his decease, when he had become alike in- 
dilTerent to the adulation of friends or the censure of enemies, and when his 
power had forever departed either to reward the one or punish the other. It 
was then, if ever, as his body lay lifeless in the city of Chicago, that the true 
feeling of a people would manifest itself; and it did manifest itself, not only 
there, but throughout the nation, to an extent scarcely, if ever, witnessed since 
the death of the Father of his Country. The badges of mourning were seen 
displayed, not only from the public buildings and the mansions of the rich, but 
the cottages of the poor, the carts of the workman, and the implements of the 
laborer were everywhere to be seen draped with the habiliments of woe, all the 



2o6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

more touching as they were simple and plain. The people's favorite in life, he 
was followed by their lamentations in death. 

But Judge Douglas possessed not only the power of fascinating the masses ; 
he was a marked man wherever he went and with whomsoever he associated. 
No matter whether as a lawyer at the bar ; as a judge on the bench ; at an 
agricultural society, where the skilled in mechanical and industrial pursuits were 
assembled ; at some college commencement, where the learned were convened ; 
in the other house of Congress, in the midst of the tumult and commotion of its 
most excited debates ; in this more deliberative body, or before the popular 
assembly of the people ; wherever he appeared he always shone conspicuous. 
He was one of the few men who have proved themselves equal to every 
emergency in which they have been called upon to act. I remember well when 
he was transferred from the House of Representatives to the Senate, his enemies 
predicted and his friends feared that his talents were not fitted for this body, 
and that he would be unable to sustain the reputation he had acquired in the 
more popular branch. He entered here when the great men whose talents and 
learning and eloquence have shed an undying lustre on the American Senate — 
when Clay, Webster, Benton, and Calhoun, in the vigor of manhood, full of 
wisdom and experience, were still here, and proved himself no mean compeer 
of either. His speech of 1850, wherein he met and refuted the positions of the 
great Carolinian, upon the very points which have been made the pretexts of the 
Southern rebellion, was, perhaps, the greatest effort of his life. 

The distinguishing characteristics of Judge Douglas, which enabled him to 
cope successfully with the greatest intellects of the age, were fearlessness, quick- 
ness of apprehension, a strong will, and indomitable energy. He knew no 
such word as fail. He had full confidence in himself, and of his ability to 
accomplish whatever he undertook. In controversy he was unsurpassed ; and 
without pretension either to accomplished scholarship or eloquence, there was 
a fullness in his voice, an earnestness in his manner, a directness in his argu- 
ment, and a determination in his every look and action, which never failed to 
command attention ; and, often electrifying the multitude, would elicit un- 
bounded applause. This crowded chamber has often been witness of the delight 
with which the multitude hung upon his words. 

Of the political course of Judge Douglas, and its effect on the country, it 
does not become me to speak ; but I may be permitted to say that, when a por- 
tion of the opposition to the administration assumed the position of armed 
resistance to its authority, and attempted by force to dismember the Republic, 
he at once took sides with his country. His course had much to do in pro- 
ducing that unanimity in support of the Government which is now seen through- 




Lyman Trumbull. 



2og MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

out the loyal States. The sublime spectacle of twenty million people rising as 
one man in vindication of constitutional liberty and free government, when 
assailed by misguided rebels and plotting traitors, is, to a considerable extent, 
due to his efforts. His magnanimous and patriotic course in this trying hour 
of his coimtry's destiny was the crowning act of his life. All his life long a 
devoted partisan of the Democratic faith, he did not hesitate, when his country 
was in peril chiefly from those who had formerly been his political associates, 
to give his powerful support and the aid of his great influence to the Govern- 
ment, though controlled by political adversaries. If, in thus discharging his 
duty. Judge Douglas manifested a disinterestedness, a magnanimity, and a 
patriotism which entitle him to credit, it is but just to say that he was met by 
his political opponents in a similar spirit. Perhaps the highest compliment ever 
paid him, and one which few statesmen have ever received, was that extended to 
him by the Legislature of Illinois, on his return to the State after the close of 
the last session of the Senate. That body, controlled in both its branches by 
his political adversaries, unanimously invited him to address them on the con- 
dition of the country ; and nobly did he respond to the invitation. His address 
delivered on that occasion, which, by order of the Legislature, was extensively 
circulated through the State, will ever remain an enduring monument to his 
fame, and an example worthy of all imitation of the sacrifice of pride to prin- 
ciple, of self to country, and of party to patriotism. 

(From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, July 9, 1861.) 





FAREWELL ADDRESS. 209 



Farewell Address. 

By JEFFERSON DAVIS, of Mississippi. 

(Born 1808, died 1889.) 

RISE, Mr. President, for the purpose of announcing to the Senate that 
I have satisfactory evidence that the State of Mississippi, by a solemn 
ordinance of her people in convention assembled, has declared her 
separation from the United States. Under these circumstances, of 
course, my functions are terminated here. It has seemed to me 
proper, however, that I should appear in the Senate to announce that 
fact to my associates, and I will say but very little more. The occasion does 
not invite me to go into argument, and my physical condition would not permit 
me to do so if it were otherwise; and j^et it seems to become me to say some- 
thing on the part of the State I here represent, on an occasion so solemn as this. 
It is known to the Senators who have served with me here, that I have for 
many years advocated, as an essential attribute of State sovereignty, the right 
of a State to secede from the Union. Therefore, if I had not believed there was 
justifiable cause ; if I had thought that Mississippi was acting without sufficient 
provocation, or without any existing necessity, I should still, under my theory 
of the government, because of my allegiance to the State of which I am a citi- 
zen, have been bound by her action. I, however, may be permitted to say that 
I do think that she has justifiable cause, and I approve of her act. I conferred 
with her people before that act was taken, counseled them then that if the state 
of things, which they apprehended should exist when the convention met, they 
should take the action which they have now adopted. 

I hope none who hear me will confound this expression of mine with the 
advocacy of the right of a State to remain in the Union, and to disregard its 
constitutional obligations by the nullification of the law. Such is not my theory. 
Nullification and secession, so often confounded, are, indeed, antagonistic prin- 
ciples. Nullification is a remedy which it is sought to apply within the Union, 
and against the agent of the States. It is only to be justified wfien the agent 
has violated his constitutional obligation, and a State, assuming to judge for 
itself, denies the right of the agent thus to act, and appeals to the other States 
of the Union for a decision ; but when the States themselves, and when the 




Jefferson Davis. 



FAREWELL ADDRESS. 211 

people of the States, have so acted as to convince us that they will not regard 
our constitutional rights, then, and then for the first time, arises the doctrine 
of secession in its practical application. \ 

A great man who now reposes with his fathers, and who has been often 
arraigned for a want of fealty to the Union, advocated the doctrine of nullifica- 
tion, because it preserved the Union. It was because of his deep-seated attach- 
ment to the Union, his determination to find some remedy for existing ills 
short of a severance of the ties which bound South Carolina to the other States, 
that Mr. Calhoun advocated the doctrine of nullification, which he proclaimed 
to be peaceful, to be within the limits of State power, not to disturb the Union, 
but only to be a means of bringing the agent before the tribunal of the States 
for their judgment. 

Secession belongs to a different class of remedies. It is to be justified upon 
the basis that the States are sovereign. There was a time when none denied it. 
I hope the time may come again, when a better comprehension of the theory 
of our Government, and the inalienable rights of the people of the States, will 
prevent anyone from denying that each State is a sovereign, and thus may re- 
claim the grants which it has made to any agent whomsoever. 

I, therefore, say I concur in the action of the people of Mississippi, believ- 
ing it to be necessary and proper, and should have been bound by their action 
if my belief had been otherwise ; and this brings me to the important point which 
I wish on this last occasion to present to the Senate. It is by this confounding 
of nullification and secession that the name of the great man, whose ashes now 
mingle with his mother earth, has been invoked to justify coercion against a 
seceded State. The phrase, " to execute the laws," was an expression which 
General Jackson applied to the case of a State refusing to obey the laws while 
yet a member of the Union. That is not the case which is now presented. 
The laws are to be executed over the United States, and upon the people of 
the United States. They have no relation to any foreign country. It is a per- 
version of terms, at least it is a great misapprehension of the case, which cites 
that expression for application to a State which has withdrawn from the Union. 
You may make war on a foreign State. If it be for the purpose of coercion, 
they may make war against a State which has withdrawn from the Union ; but 
there are no laws of the United States to be executed within the limits of a 
seceded State. A State, finding herself in the condition in which Mississippi has 
judged she is, in which her safety requires that she should provide for the 
maintenance of her rights out of the Union, surrenders all the benefits (and they 
are known to be many), deprives herself of the advantages (they are known to 
be great), severs all the ties of affection (and they are close and enduring) 



212 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



which have bound her to the Union ; and thus divesting herself of every benefit, 
taking upon herself every burden, she claims to be exempt from any power to 
execute the laws of the United States within her limits. * * * 

I find in myself, perhaps, a type of the general feeling of my constituents 
toward yours. I am sure I feel no hostility to you. Senators from the North. 
I am sure there is not one of you, whatever sharp discussion there may have 
been between us, to whom I cannot now say, in the presence of my God, I 
wish you well ; and such, I am sure, is the feeling of the people whom I repre- 
sent toward those whom you represent. I, therefore, feel that I but express 
their desire when I say I hope, and they hope, for peaceful relations with you, 
though we must part. They may be mutually beneficial to us in the future, as 
they have been in the past, if you so will it. The reverse may bring disaster on 
every portion of the country ; and if you will have it thus, we will invoke the 
God of our fathers, who delivered them from the power of the lion, to protect 
us from the ravages of the bear ; and thus, putting our trust in God, and in our 
own firm hearts and strong arms, we will vindicate the right as best we can. 

In the course of my service here, associated at different times with a great 
variety of Senators, I see now around me some with whom I have served long ; 
there have been points of collision ; but whatever of offense there has been to 
me, I leave here; I carry with me no hostile remembrance. Whatever offense 
T have given which has not been redressed, or for which satisfaction has not 
been demanded, I have. Senators, in this hour of our parting, to offer you my 
apology for any pain which, in heat of discussion, I have inflicted. I go hence 
unincumbered of the remembrance of any injury received, and having discharged 
the duty of making the only reparation in my power for any injury offered. 

Mr. President and Senators, having made the announcement which the 
occasion seemed to me to require, it only remains for me to bid you a final adieu. 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, January 21, 1861, on the occasion of his withdrawal from the 
Union.) 





INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 213 



Inaugural Address. 

By JEFFERSON DAVIS, of Mississippi. 

(Born 1808, died 1889.) 



»ENTLEMEN OF THE CONGRESS OF THE CONFEDERATE 
STATES OF AMERICA, FRIENDS, AND FELLOW CITIZENS : 
Our present condition, achieved in a manner unprecedented in the 
history of nations, ilkistrates the American idea that governments 
rest upon the consent of the governed, and that it is the right 
of the people to alter and aboHsh governments whenever they be- 
come destructive to the ends for which they were established. The declared 
compact of the Union, from which we have withdrawn, was to establish justice, 
insure domestic tranquillity, provide for the common defense, promote the 
general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our 
posterity; and when, in the judgment of the sovereign States now composing 
this Confederacy, it has been perverted from the purposes for which it was 
ordained, and ceased to answer the ends for which it was established, a 
peaceful appeal to the ballot-box declared that, so far as they were con- 
cerned, the Government created by that compact should cease to exist. In 
this they merely asserted the right which the Declaration of Independence of 
1776 defined to be inalienable. Of the time and occasion of this exercise, they 
as sovereigns were the final judges, each for himself. The impartial, enlightened 
verdict of mankind will vindicate the rectitude of our conduct ; and he who 
knows the hearts of men will judge of the sincerity with which we labored to 
preserve the Government of our fathers, in its spirit. 

The right, solemnly proclaimed at the birth of the States, and which has 
been affirmed and reaffirmed in the Bills of Rights of the States subsequently 
admitted into the Union of 1789, undeniably recognizes in the people the power 
to resume the authority delegated for the purposes of government. Thus the 
sovereign States here represented proceeded to form this Confederacy; and it 
is by the abuse of language that their act has been denominated revolution. 
They formed a new alliance ; but within each State its Government has remained. 
The rights of person and property have not been disturbed, The agent through 



214 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

whom they communicated with foreign nations is changed; but this does not 
necessarily interrupt their international relations. Sustained by the conscious- 
ness that the transition from the former Union to the present Confederacy has 
not proceeded from a disregard on our part of our just obligations or any failure 
to perform every constitutional duty, moved by no interest or passion to invade 
the rights of others, anxious to cultivate peace and commerce with all nations; 
if we may not hope to avoid war, we may at least expect that posterity will 
acquit us of having needlessly engaged in it. Doubly justified by the absence 
of wrong on our part, and by wanton aggression on the part of others, there 
can be no use to doubt the courage and patriotism of the people of the Con- 
federate States will be found equal to any measure of defense which soon their 
security may require. 

An agricultural people, whose chief interest is the export of a commodity 
required in every manufacturing country, our true policy is peace and the freest 
trade which our necessities will permit. It is alike our interest and that of all 
those to whom we would sell and from whom we would buy, that there should 
be the fewest practicable restrictions upon the interchange of commodities. 
There can be but little rivalry between ours and any manufacturing or navigating 
community, such as the Northeastern States of the American Union. It must 
follow, therefore, that mutual interest would invite good-will and kind offices. 
If, however, passion or lust of dominion should cloud the judgment or inflame 
the ambition of those States, we must prepare to meet the emergency, and 
maintain, by the final arbitrament of the sword, the position which we have 
assumed among the nations of the earth. 

We have entered upon a career of independence, and it must be inflexibly 
pursued through many years of controversy with our late associates of the 
Northern States. We have vainly endeavored to secure tranquillity and obtain 
respect for the rights to which we were entitled. As a necessity, not a choice, 
we have resorted to the remedy of separation; and henceforth our energies 
must be directed to the conduct of our own affairs, and the perpetuity of the 
Confederacy which we have formed. If a just perception of mutual interest 
shall permit us peaceably to pursue our separate political career, my most 
earnest desire will have been fulfilled. But if this be denied us, and the integ- 
rity of our territory and jurisdiction be assailed, it will but remain for us with 
firm resolve to appeal to arms and invoke the blessing of Providence on a just 
cause. * * * 

Actuated solely by a desire to preserve our own rights and to promote our 
own welfare, the separation of the Confederate States has been marked by no 
aggression upon others, and followed by no domestic convulsion. Our indus- 



INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 215 

trial pursuits have received no check, the cultivation of our fields progresses 
as heretofore; and even should we be involved in war, there would be no con- 
siderable diminution in the production of the staples which have constituted our 
exports, in which the commercial world has an interest scarcely less than our 
own. This common interest of producer and consumer can only be intercepted 
by an exterior force, which should obstruct its transmission to foreign markets; 
a course of conduct which would be detrimental to manufacturing and commer- 
cial interests abroad. 

Should reason guide the action of the Government from which we have 
separated, a policy so detrimental to the civilized world — the Northern States 
included — could not be dictated by even a stronger desire to inflict injury upon 
us ; but if it be otherwise, a terrible responsibility will rest upon it, and the 
suffering of millions will bear testimony to the folly and wickedness of our 
aggressors. In the meantime, there will remain to us, besides the ordinary 
remedies before suggested, the well-known resources for retaliation upon the 
commerce of an enemy. * * * "We have changed the constituent parts 
but not the system of our Government. The Constitution formed by our fathers 
is that of these Confederate States. In their exposition of it, and in the judicial 
construction it has received, we have a light which reveals its true meaning. 
Thus instructed as to the just interpretation of that instrument^ and ever remem- 
bering that all offices are but trusts held for the people, and that delegated 
powers are to be strictly construed, I will hope by due diligence in the perform- 
ance of my duties — though I may disappoint your expectation — yet to retain, 
when retiring, something of the good-will and confidence which will welcome my 
entrance into office. 

It is joyous in the midst of perilous times to look around upon a people 
united in heart, when one purpose of high resolve animates and actuates the 
whole; where the sacrifices to be made are not weighed in the balance against 
honor, right, liberty, and equality. Obstacles may retard, but they cannot long 
prevent, the progress of a movement sanctioned by its justice and sustained by a 
virtuous people. Reverently let us invoke the God of our fathers to guide and 
protect us in our efiforts to perpetuate the principles which by his blessing they 
were able to vindicate, establish, and transmit to their posterity ; and with a 
continuance of his favor, ever gratefully acknowledged, we may hopefully look 
forward to success, to peace, to prosperity. 

(Delivered at Montgomery, Ala., February i8, 1861.) 




2i6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The System of Slavery. 

By HENRY WARD BEECHER, of New York. 

(Born 1813, died 1887.) 



:OR more than twenty-five years I have been made perfectly familiar 
with popular assemblies in all parts of my covmtry, except the ex- 
treme South. There has not, for the whole of that time, been a 
single day of my life when it would have been safe for me to go 
south of Mason and Dixon's line in my own country, and all for one 
reason : my solemn, earnest, persistent testimony against that which 
I consider to be the most atrocious thing under the sun — the system of 
American slavery in a great, free republic. (Cheers.) I have passed through 
that early period when right of free speech was denied to me. Again and again 
I have attempted to address audiences that, for no other crime than that of 
free speech, visited me with all manner of contumelious epithets ; and now since 
I have been in England, although I have met with greater kindness and courtesy 
on the part of most than I deserved, yet, on the other hand. I perceive that the 
Southern influence prevails to some extent in England. (Applause and uproar.) 
It is my old acquaintance ; I understand it perfectly (laughter) and I have always 
held it to be an unfailing truth that where a man had a cause that would bear 
examination he was perfectly willing to have it spoken about. (Applause.) 
And when in Manchester I saw those huge placards : " Who is Henry Ward 
Beecher?" (Laughter, cries of "quite right," and applause.) And when in 
Liverpool I was told that there were those blood-red placards, purporting to 
say what Henry Ward Beecher had said, and calling upon Englishmen to 
suppress free speech — I tell you what I thought. I thought simply this : 
" I am glad of it." (Laughter.) Why? Because if they had felt perfectly 
secure, that you are the minions of the South and the slaves of slavery, they 
would have been perfectly still. (Applause and uproar.) And, therefore, when 
I saw so much nervous apprehension that, if I were permitted to speak — (hisses 
and applause) — when I found they were afraid to have me speak — (hisses, 
laughter and " No, no ! ") — when I found that they considered my speaking 
damaging to their cause — (applause) — when I found that they appealed from 




Henry Ward Beecher. 



2i8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

facts and reasonings to mob law (applause and uproar), I said, no man need 
tell me what the heart and secret counsel of these men are. They tremble and 
are afraid. (Applause, laughter, hisses, " No, no! " and a voice: " New York 
mob.") Now, personally, it is a matter of very little consequence to me 
whether I speak here to-night or not. (Laughter and cheers.) But, one thing 
is very certain, if you do permit me to speak here to-night you will hear very 
plain talking. (Applause and hisses.) You will not find a man — (interrup- 
tion) — you will not find me to- be a man that dared to speak about Great 
Britain three thousand miles off, and then is afraid to speak to Great Britain 
when he stands on her shores. (Immense applause and hisses.) And if I do 
not mistake the tone and temper of Englishmen, they had rather have a man 
who opposes them in a manly way (applause from all parts of the hall) than a 
sneak that agrees with them in an unmanly way. (Applause and " Bravo ! ") 
Now, if I can carry you with me by sound convictions, I shall be immensely glad 
(applause) ; but if I cannot carry you with me by facts and sound arguments, 
I do not wish you to go with me at all ; and all that I ask is simply fair play. 
(Applause, and a voice: "You shall have it too.") 

Those of you who are kind enough to wish to favor my speaking — and 
you will observe that my voice is slightly husky, from having spoken almost 
every night in succession for some time past — those who wish to hear me 
will do me the kindness simply to sit still and to keep still ; and I and my 
friends the secessionists will make all the noise. (Laughter.) 

There are two dominant races in modern history — the Germanic and the 
Romanic races. The Germanic races tend to personal liberty, to a sturdy 
individualism, to civil and to political liberty. The Romanic race tends to 
absolutism in government ; it is clannish ; it loves chieftains ; it develops a 
people that crave strong and showy governments to support and plan for them. 
The Anglo-Saxon race belongs to the great German family, and is a fair expo- 
nent of its peculiarities. The Anglo-Saxon carries self-government and self- 
development with him wherever he goes. He has popular government and 
popular industry; for the effects of a generous civil liberty are not seen 
a whit more plain in the good order, in the intelligence, and in the virtue of a 
self-governing people, than in their amazing enterprise, and the scope and power 
of their creative industry. The power to create riches is just as much a part 
of the Anglo-Saxon virtues as the power to create good order and social safety. 
The things required for prosperous labor, prosperous manufactures, and pros- 
perous commerce are three: first, liberty; second, liberty; third, liberty. (" Hear, 
hear! ") Though these are not merely the same liberty, as I shall show 
you. First, there must be liberty to follow those laws of business which 



THE SYSTEM OF SLAVERY. 219 

experience has developed, without imposts or restrictions or governmental 
intrusions. Business simply wants to be let alone. ("Hear, hear!") Then, 
secondly, there must be liberty to distribute and exchange products of industry 
in any market without burdensome tariffs, without imposts, and without vex- 
atious regulations. There must be these two liberties — liberty to create wealth, 
as the makers of it think best, according to the light and experience which 
business has given them ; and then liberty to distribute what they have created 
without unnecessary vexatious burdens. The comprehensive law of the ideal 
industrial condition of the world is free manufacture and free trade. {" Hear, 
hear!" A voice: "The Morrill tarifif." Another voice : "Monroe.") I have said 
there were three elements of liberty. The third is the necessity of an intelligent 
and free race of customers. There must be freedom among producers; there 
must be freedom among the distributors; there must be freedom among the 
customers. It may not have occurred to you that it makes any difference 
what one's customers are, but it does in all regular and prolonged business. 
The condition of the customer determines how much he will buy, determines of 
what sort he will buy. Poor and ignorant people buy little and that of the 
poorest kind. The richest and the intelligent, having the more means to buy, 
buy the most and always buy the best. Here, then, are the three liberties : 
liberty of the producer, liberty of the distributor, and liberty of the consumer. 
The first two need no discussion ; they have been long thoroughly and bril- 
liantly illustrated by the political economists of Great Britain and by her 
eminent statesmen ; but it seems to me that enough attention has not been 
directed to the third ; and, with your patience, I will dwell upon that for a 
moment, before proceeding to other topics. 

It is a necessity of every manufacturing and commercial people that their 
customers should be very wealthy and intelligent. Let us put the subject before 
you in the familiar light of your own local experience. To whom do the 
tradesmen of Liverpool sell the most goods at the highest profit? To the 
ignorant and poor or to the educated and prosperous ? (A voice : " To the 
Southerners." Laughter.) The poor man buys simply for his body; he buys 
food, he buys clothing, he buys fuel, he buys lodging. * * * 

On the other hand, a man well off — how is it with him ? He buys in far 
greater quantity. He can afford to do it ; he has the money to pay for it. 
He buys in far greater variety, because he seeks to gratify not merely physical 
wants, but also mental wants. He buys for the satisfaction of sentiment and 
taste, as well as of sense. He buys silk, wool, flax, cotton ; he buys all metals — 
iron, silver, gold, platinum ; in short he buys for all necessities and all sub- 
stances. But that is not all. He buys a better quality of goods. He buys 



220 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

richer silks, finer cottons, higher-grained wools. Now a rich silk means so much 
skill and care of somebody's, that has been expended upon it to make it finer 
and richer; and so of cotton and so of wool. That is, the price of the finer 
goods runs back to the very beginning and remunerates the workman as well 
as the merchant. Now, the whole laboring community is as much interested 
and profited as the mere merchant, in this buying and selling of the higher 
grades in the greater varieties and quantities. * * * Both the workman 
and the merchant are profited by having purchasers that demand quality, variety, 
and quantity. Now, if this be so in the town or the city, it can only be so 
because it is a law. This is the specific development of a general or universal 
law, and, therefore, we should expect to find it as true of a nation as of a city 
like Liverpool. I know that it is so, and you know that it is true of all the 
world ; and it is just as important to have customers educated, intelligent, moral, 
and rich out of Liverpool as it is in Liverpool. (Applause.) They are able 
to buy ; they want variety ; they want the very best, and those are the customers 
you want. That nation is the best customer that is freest, because freedom 
works prosperity, industry, and wealth. Great Britain, then, aside from moral 
considerations, has a direct commercial and pecuniary interest in the liberty, civi- 
lization, and wealth of every nation on the globe. (Loud applause.) You also 
have an interest in this, because you are a moral and religious people. (" Oh, 
oh ! " laughter and applause.) You desire it from the highest motives ; and 
godliness is profitable in all things, having the promise of the life that now is 
as well as of that which is to come ; but if there were no hereafter, and if man 
had no progress in this life, and if there were no question of civilization at all, 
it would be worth your while to protect civilization and liberty merely as a 
commercial speculation. * * * 

They have said that your chief want is cotton. I deny it. Your chief 
want is consumers. (Applause and hisses.) You have got skill, you have 
got capital, and you have got machinery enough to manufacture goods for 
the whole population of the globe. You could turn out fourfold as much as 
you do, if you only had the market to sell in. It is not so much the want, there- 
fore, of fabric, though there may be a temporary obstruction of it ; but the 
principal and increasing want — increasing from year to year — is, where shall 
we find men to buy what we can manufacture so fast? (Interruption and a 
voice, " The Morrill tariflf," and applause.) Before the American war broke out, 
your warehouses were loaded with goods that you could not sell. (Applause and 
hisses.) You had over-manufactured; what is the meaning of over-manufac- 
turing but this: that you had skill, capital, machinery, to create faster than you 
had customers to take goods off your hands ? And you know that rich as Great 



THE SYSTEM OF SLAVERY. 221 

Britain is, vast as are her manufactures, if she could have fourfold the present 
demand, she could have fourfold riches to-morrow; and every political econo- 
mist will tell you that your want is not cotton primarily, but customers. There- 
fore, the doctrine, how to make customers, is a great deal more important 
to Great Britain than the doctrine how tO' raise cotton. It is to that doctrine 
I ask from you, business men, practical men, men of fact, sagacious English- 
men, to that point I ask a moment's attention. (Shouts of " Oh, oh ! " hisses 
and applause.) There are no more continents to be discovered. (" Hear, hear! ") 
The market of the future must be found — how? There is very little hope of any 
more demand being created by new fields. If you are to have a better market 
there must be some kind of process invented to make the old fields better. 
(A voice: " Tell us something new," shouts of "Order! " and interruption.) Let 
us look at it, then. You must civilize the world in order to make a better 
class of purchasers. (Interruption.) If you were to press Italy down again 
under the feet of despotism, Italy, discouraged, could draw but very few sup- 
plies from you. * * * 

A savage is a man. of one story, and that one story a cellar. When a man 
begins to be civilized, he raises another story. When you Christianize and 
civilize the man, you put story upon story, for you develop faculty after faculty ; 
and you have to supply every story with your productions. The savage is 
a man one story deep; the civilized man is thirty stories high. (Applause.) 
Now, if you go to a lodging-house, where there are three or four men, your 
sales to them may, no doubt, be worth something ; but if you go to a lodging- 
house like some of those which I saw in Edinburgh, which seemed to contain 
about twenty stories (" Oh, oh I " and interruption), every story of which is 
full, and all who occupy buy of you — which is the better customer, the man 
who is drawn out or the man who is pinched up? (Laughter.) Now, there 
is in this a great and sound principle of economy. ("Yah, yah ! " from the 
passage outside the hall and loud laughter.) If the South should be rendered 
independent — (at this juncture mingled cheering and hissing became immense; 
half the audience rose to their feet, waving hats and handkerchiefs, and in every 
part of the hall there was the greatest commotion and uproar). You have had 
your turn now; now let me have mine again. (Loud applause and laughter.) 
It is a little inconvenient to talk against the wind; but, after all, if you will 
just keep good natured — I am not going to lose my temper ; will you watch 
yours? (Applause.) Besides all that, it rests me, and gives me a chance, you 
know, to get my breath. (Applause and hisses.) And I think that the bark 
of those men is worse than their bite. They do not mean any harm — they 
don't know any better. (Loud laughter, applause, hisses and continued uproar.) 



222 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

I was saying, when these responses broke in, that it was worth our while to 
consider both alternatives. What will be the result if this present struggle 
shall eventuate in the separation of America and making the South — (loud 
applause, hisses, hooting, and cries of " Bravo ! ") — a slave territory exclusively 
— (cries of " No, no ! " and laughter) — and the North a free territory — what 
will be the final result? You will lay the foundation for carrying the slave 
population clear through to the Pacific ocean. This is the first step. There is 
not a man that has been a leader of the South any time within these twenty 
years, that has not had this for a plan. It was for this that Texas was invaded, 
first by colonists, next by marauders, until it was wrested from Mexico. It 
was for this that they engaged in the Mexican War itself, by which the vast 
territory reaching to the Pacific was added to the Union. Never for a moment 
have they given up the plan of spreading the American institutions, as they call 
them, straight through toward the West; until the slave, who has washed his 
feet in the Atlantic, shall be carried to wash them in the Pacific. (Cries of 
" Question," and uproar.) There ! I have got that statement out and you 
cannot put it back. (Laughter and applause.) Now, let us consider the pros- 
pect. If the South becomes a slave empire, what relation will it have to you as 
a customer? (A voice: " Or any other man." Laughter.) It would be an em- 
pire of twelve millions of people. Now, of these, eight millions are white and 
four millions black. (A voice: ''How many have you got?" Applause and 
laughter. Another voice : " Free your own slaves.") Consider that one-third 
of the whole are the miserably poor, unbuying blacks. (Cries of " No, no ! " 
" Yes, yes ! " and interrruption.) You do not manufacture much for them. 
(Hisses, " Oh ! " " No.") You have not got machinery coarse enough. 
(Laughter and " No.") Your labor is too skilled by far to manufacture bag- 
ging and linsey-woolsey. (A Southerner : " We are going to free them, every 
one.") Then you and I agree exactly. (Laughter.) One other third consists 
of a poor, unskilled, degraded white population; and the remaining one-third, 
which is a large allowance, we will say, intelligent and rich. 

Now here are twelve millions of people, and only one-third of them are cus- 
tomers that can afford to buy the kind of goods that you bring to market. (Inter- 
ruption and uproar.) My friends, I saw a man once, who was a little late at a 
railway station, chase an express train. He did not catch it. (Laughter.) If you 
are going to stop this meeting, you have got to stop it before I speak ; for after 
I have got the things out, you may chase as long as you please — you would 
not catch them. (Laughter and interruption.) But there is luck in leisure ; I'm 
going to take it easy. (Laughter.) Two-thirds of the population of the 
Southern States to-day are non-purchasers of English goods. (A voice : " No, 



THE SYSTEM OF SLAVERY. 223 

they are not " ; " No, no ! " and uproar.) Now you must recollect another fact 

— namely, that this is going on clear through to the Pacific ocean ; and if by 
sympathy or help you establish a slave empire, you sagacious Britons ^(" Oh, 
oh ! " and hooting) — if you like it better, then, I will leave the adjective out — 
(laughter, " Hear! " and applause) — are busy in favoring the establishment of an 
empire from ocean to ocean that should have fewest customers and the largest 
non-buying population. (Applause, " No, no ! " A voice : " I thought it was 
the happy people that populated fastest.") * * * 

It is said that the North is fighting for Union, and not for emancipation. 
The North is fighting for Union, for that insures emancipation. (Loud cheers, 
" Oh, oh ! " " No, no ! " and cheers.) A great many men say to ministers of the 
Gospel : " You pretend to be preaching and working for the love of the people. 
Why, you are all the time preaching for the sake of the Church." What does 
the minister say ? " It is by means of the Church that we help the people," and 
when men say that we are fighting for the Union, I too say we are fighting for 
the Union. (" Hear, hear! " and a voice: " That's right.") But the motive deter- 
mines the value; and why are we fighting for the Union? Because we never 
shall forget the testimony of our enemies. They have gone off declaring that 
the Union in the hands of the North was fatal to slavery. (Loud applause.) 
There is testimony in court for you. (A voice : " See that," and laughter.) 

^: He * 

In the first place I am ashamed to confess that such was the thoughtlessness 

— (interruption) — such was the stupor of the North — (renewed interruption) 

— you will get a word, at a time; to-morrow will let folks see what it is you 
don't want to hear — that for a period of twenty-five years she went to sleep, and 
permitted herself to be drugged and poisoned with the Southern prejudice 
against black men. (Applause and uproar.) The evil was made worse, be- 
cause, when any object whatever has caused anger between political parties, a 
political animosity arises against that object, no matter how innocent in itself; 
no matter what were the original influences which excited the quarrel. Thus 
the colored man has been the football between the two parties in the North, 
and has suffered accordingly. I confess it to my shame. But I am speaking 
now on my own ground, for I began twenty-five years ago, with a small party, to 
combat the unjust dislike of the colored man. (Loud applause, dissension, and 
uproar. The interruption at this point became so violent that the friends of Mr. 
Beecher throughout the hall rose to their feet, waving hats and handkerchiefs, 
and renewing their shouts of applause. The interruption lasted some minutes.) 
Well, I have lived to see a total revolution in the Northern feeling — I stand 
here to bear solemn witness of that. It is not my opinion ; it is my knowledge. 



224 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

(Great uproar.) Those men who undertook to stand up for the rights of all 
men — black as well as white — have increased in number ; and now what party 
in the North represents those men that resist the evil prejudices of past years? 
The Republicans are that party. (Loud applause.) And who are those men 
in the North that have oppressed the negro? They are the Peace Democrats; 
and the prejudice for which in England you are attempting to punish me, is a 
prejudice raised by the men who have opposed me all my life. These pro- 
slavery Democrats abused the negro. I defended him, and they mobbed me for 
doing it. Oh, justice ! (Loud laughter, applause, and hisses.) * * * 

There is another fact that I wish to allude to — not for the sake of reproach 
or blame, but by way of claiming your more lenient consideration — and that 
is, that slavery was entailed upon us by your action. (" Hear, hear! ") Against 
the earnest protests of the Colonists the then Government of Great Britain — 
I will concede not knowing what were the mischiefs — ignorantly, but in point 
of fact, forced slave traffic on the unwilling Colonists. (Great uproar, in the 
midst of which one individual was lifted up and carried out of the room amidst 
cheers and hisses.) 

The Chairman : If you would only sit down no disturbance would take 
place. 

(The disturbance having subsided, Mr. Beecher continued.) 
I was going to ask you, suppose each child is born with hereditary dis- 
ease; suppose this disease was entailed upon him by parents who had con- 
tracted it by their own misconduct, would it be fair that those parents 
that had brought into the world the diseased child, should rail at that child 
because it was diseased? (" No, no! ") Would not the child have a right to 
turn 'round and say : " F'ather, it was your fault that I had it, and you ought 
to be pleased to be patient with my deficiencies." (Applause and hisses, and 
cries of " Order ! " Great interruption and great disturbance here took place 
on the right of the platform; and the chairman said that if the persons around 
the unfortunate individual who had caused the disturbance would allow him to 
speak alone, but not assist him in making the disturbance, it might soon be put 
an end to. The interruption continued until another person was carried out of 
the hall. Mr. Beecher continued.) I do not ask that you should justify slavery 
in us, because it was wrong in you two hundred years ago ; but having ignorantly 
been the means of fixing it upon us, now that we are struggling with mortal 
struggles to free ourselves from it, we have a right to your tolerance, your 
patience, and charitable constructions. 

No man can unveil the future; no man can tell what revolutions are about 
to break upon the world; no man can tell what destiny belongs to France, nor 



THE SYSTEM OF SLAVERY. 225 

to any of the European powers ; but one thing is certain, that in the exigencies 
of the future there will be combinations and recombinations, and that those 
nations that are of the same faith, the same blood, and the same substantial in-, 
terests ought not to be alienated from each other, but ought to stand together. 
(Immense cheering and hisses.) I do not say that you ought not to be in the 
most friendly alliance with France or with Germany; but I do say that your 
own children, the offspring of England, ought to be nearer to you than any 
people of strange tongue. (A voice: "Degenerate sons," applavise and hisses; 
another voice: " What about the Trent? ") If there had been any feelings of 
bitterness in America, let me tell you that they had been excited, rightly or 
wrongly, under the impression that Great Britain was going to intervene be- 
tween us and our own lawful struggle. (A voice : " No ! " and applause.) 
With the evidence that there is no such intention, all bitter feelings will pass 
away. (Applause.) We do not agree with the recent doctrine of neutrality as a 
question of law. But it is past, and we are not disposed to raise that question. 
We accept it now as a fact, and we say that the utterance of Lord Russell 
at Blairgowrie — (Applause, hisses, and a voice: " What about Lord 
Brougham?") — together with the declaration of the Government in stopping 
war-steamers here — (great uproar, and applause) — has gone far toward quieting 
every fear and removing every apprehension from our minds. (Uproar and 
shouts of applause.) And now in the future it is the work of every good man 
and patriot not to create divisions, but to do the things that will make for 
peace. (" Oh, oh," and laughter.) On our part it shall be done. (Applause 
and hisses, and " No, no.") On your part it ought to be done ; and when in 
any of the convulsions that come upon the world, Great Britain finds herself 
struggling single-handed against the gigantic powers that spread oppression and 
darkness — (applause, hisses, and uproar) — there ought to be such cordiality 
that she can turn and say to her first-born and most illustrious child, " Come ! " 
("Hear, hear!" applause, tremendous cheers, and uproar.) I will not say that 
England cannot again, as hitherto, single-handed manage any power — (ap- 
plause and uproar) — but I will say that England and America together for re- 
ligion and liberty — (A voice : " Soap, soap," uproar, and great applause) — are 
a match for the world. (Applause ; a voice : " They don't want any more soft 
soap.") Now, gentlemen and ladies — (A voice : " Sam Slick ;" and another 
voice : " Ladies and gentlemen, if you please,") — when I came I was asked 
whether I would answer questions, and I very readily consented to do so, as I 
had in other places ; but I will tell you it was because I expected to have the 
opportunity of speaking with some sort of ease and quiet. (A voice : " So you 
have.") I have for an hour and a half spoken against a storm — (" Hear, hear! ") 



226 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



— and you yourselves are witnesses that, by the interruption, I have been obliged 
to strive with my voice, so that I no longer have the power to control this 
assembly. (Applause.) And although I am in spirit perfectly willing to answer 
any question, and more than glad of the chance, yet I am by this very unneces- 
sary opposition to-night incapacitated physically from doing it. Ladies and 
gentlemen, I bid you good evening. 

(Being an address at Liverpool, October i6, 1863.) 




THE WAR AND ITS CONDUCT. 227 




The War and Its Conduct. 

By CLEMENT L. VALLANDIQHAM, of Ohio. 

(Born 1820, died 1871.) 



IR, I am one of that number who have opposed AboHtionism, or the 
political development of the antislavery sentiment of the North and 
West, from the beginning. In school, at college, at the bar, in public 
assemblies, in the Legislature, in Congress, boy and man, in time of 
peace and in time of war, at all times and at every sacrifice, I ha\e 
fought against it. It cost me ten years' exclusion from office and honor 
at that period of life when honors are sweetest. No matter; I learned early to do 
right and to wait. Sir, it is but the development of the spirit of intermeddling, 
whose children are strife and murder. Cain troubled himself about the sacrifices 
of Abel, and slew his brother. Most of the wars, contentions, litigation, and 
bloodshed, from the beginning of time, have been its fruits. The spirit of non- 
intervention is the very spirit of peace and concord. * * * 

The spirit of intervention assumed the form of Abolitionism because slavery 
was odious in name and by association to the Northern mind, and because it was 
that which most obviously marks the different civilizations of the two sections. 
The South herself, in her early and later efiforts to rid herself of it, had exposed 
the weak and offensive parts of slavery to the world. Abolition intermeddling 
taught her at last .to search for and defend the assumed social^ economic, and 
political merit and values of the institution. But there never was an hour from 
the beginning vv^hen it did not seem to me as clear as the sun at broad noon that 
the agitation in any form in the North and West of the slavery question must 
sooner or later end in disunion and civil war. This was the opinion and pre- 
diction for years of Whig and Democratic statesmen alike; and, after the 
unfortunate dissolution of the Whig party in 1854, and the organization of tlie 
present Republican party upon the exclusive antislavery and sectional basis, 
the event was inevitable; because, in the then existing temper of the public mind, 
and after the education through the press and the pulpit, the lecture and the 
political canvass, for twenty years, of a generation taught to have slavery and 
the South, the success of that party — possessed as it was of every engine of po- 



228 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

litical, business, social, and religious influence — was certain. It was only a ques- 
tion of time, and short time. Such was its strength, indeed, that I do not believe 
that the union of the Democratic party in i860 on any candidate, even though he 
had been supported also by the entire so-called conservative or anti-Lincoln vote 
of the country, would have availed to defeat it ; and, if it had, the success of the 
Abolition party would only have been postponed four years longer. The dis- 
ease had fastened too strongly upon the system to be healed until it had run its 
course. The doctrine of " the irrepressible conflict " had been taught too long, 
and accepted too widely and earnestly, to die out until it should culminate in 
secession and disunion, and, if coercion were resorted to, then in civil war. 
I believed from the first that it was the purpose of some of the apostles of that 
doctrine to force a collision between the North and the South, either to bring 
about a separation or to find a vain but bloody pretext for abolishing slavery 
in the States. In any event, I knew, or thought I knew, that the end was cer- 
tain collision and death to the Union. 

Believing thus, I have for years past denounced those who taught that 
doctrine, with all the vehemence, the bitterness, if you choose — I thought it a 
righteous, a patriotic bitterness — of an earnest and impassioned nature. * * * 
But the people did not believe me, nor those older and wiser and greater than 
I. They rejected the prophecy, and stoned the prophets. The candidate of 
the Republican party was chosen President. Secession began. Civil war was 
imminent. It was no petty insurrection, no temporary combination to obstruct 
the execution of the laws in certain States, but a revolution, systematic, delibe- 
rate, determined, and with the consent of a majority of the people of each State 
which seceded. Causeless it may have been, wicked it may have been, but there 
it was — not to be railed at, still less to be laughed at, but to be dealt with by 
statesmen as a fact. No display of vigor or force alone, however sudden or 
great, could have arrested it even at the outset. It was disunion at last. The 
wolf had come, but civil war had not yet followed. In my deliberate and solemn 
judgment there was but one wise and masterly mode of dealing with it. Non- 
coercion would avert civil war, and compromise crush out both Abolitionism 
and secession. The parent and the child would thus both perish. But a resort 
to force would at once precipitate war, hasten secession, extend disunion, and 
while it lasted utterly cut off all hope of compromise. I believed that war, if 
long enough continued, would be final, eternal disunion. I said it ; I meant it ; 
and accordingly, to the utmost of my ability and influence, I exerted myself in 
behalf of the policy of non-coercion. It was adopted by Mr. Buchanan's 
administration, with the almost unanimous consent of the Democratic and Con- 
stitutional Union parties in and out of Congress ; and in February, with the con- 




Clement L. Vallandigham. 



230 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

sent of a majority of the Republican party in the Senate and the House. But 
that party, most disastrously for the country, refused all compromise. How, 
indeed, could they accept any? That which the South demanded, and the 
Democratic and Conservative parties of the North and West were willing to 
grant, and which alone could avail to keep the peace and save the Union, implied 
a surrender of the sole vital element of the party and its platform, of the very 
principle, in fact, upon which it had just won the contest for the Presidency, not, 
indeed, by a majority of the popular vote — the majority was nearly a million 
against it — but under the forms of the Constitution. Sir, the crime, the " high 
crime," of the Republican party was not so much its refusal to compromise, as 
its original organization upon a basis and doctrine wholly inconsistent with the 
stability of the Constitution and the peace of the Union. 

The President-elect was inaugurated; and now, if only the policy of coer- 
cion could be maintained, and war thus averted, time would do its work in the 
North and the South, and final peaceable adjustment and reunion be secured. 
Some time in March it was announced that the President had resolved to con- 
tinue the policy of his predecessor, and even go a step further, and evacuate 
Sumter and the other Federal forts and arsenals in the seceded States. Plis 
own party acquiesced ; the whole country rejoiced. The policy of non-coercion 
had triumphed, and for once, sir, in my life, I found myself in an immense 
majority. No man then pretended that a Union founded in consent could be 
cemented by force. Nay, more, the President and the Secretary of State went 
further. Said Mr. Seward, in an of^cial diplomatic letter to Mr. Adams: "For 
these reasons, he (the President) would not be disposed to reject a cardinal 
dogma of theirs (the secessionists), namely, that the Federal Government could 
not reduce the seceding States to obedience by conquest, although he were dis- 
posed to question that proposition. But, in fact, the President willingly accepts 
it as true. Only an imperial or despotic Government could subjugate thor- 
oughly disafifected and insurrectionary members of the State. * * * This 
Federal republican system of ours is, of all forms of government, the very one 
which is most unfitted for such a labor." This, sir, was on the loth of April, 
and yet on that very day the fleet was under sail for Charleston. The policy of 
peace had been abandoned. Collision followed ; the militia were ordered out ; 
civil war began. 

Now, sir, on the 14th of April, I believed that coercion would bring on 
war; and war, disunion. More than that, I believed, what you all believe in your 
hearts to-day, that the South could never be conquered — never! And not 
that only, but I was satisfied — and you of the Abolition party have now proved 
it to the world — that the secret but real purpose of the war was to abolish 



THE WAR AND ITS CONDUCT. 231 

slavery in the States. * * * These were my convictions on the 14th of 
April. Had I changed them on the 15th, when I read the President's procla- 
mation^ * * * J would have changed my public conduct also. But my 
convictions did not change. I thought that, if war was disunion on the 14th 
of April, it was equally disunion on the 15th, and at all times. Believing this, 
I could not, as an honest man, a Union man, and a patriot, lend an active sup- 
port to the war; and I did not. I had rather my right arm were plucked from 
its socket and cast into eternal burnings than, with my convictions, to have 
thus defiled my soul with the guilt of moral perjury. Sir, I was not taught in 
that school which proclaims that " all is fair in politics." I loathe, abhor, and 
detest the execrable maxim. * * * Perish office, perish honors, perish life 
itself; but do the thing that is right, and do it hke a man. 

Certainly, sir, I could not doubt what he must sufifer who dare defy the 
opinions and the passions, not to say the madness, of twenty millions of people. 
* * * I did not support the war ; and to-day I bless God that not the smell 
of so much as one drop of its blood is upon my garments. Sir, I censure no 
brave man who rushed patriotically into this war; neither will I quarrel with 
any one, here or elsewhere, who gave to it an honest support. Had their con- 
victions been mine, I, too, would doubtless have done as they did. With my 
convictions I could not. But I was a Representative. War existed — by 
whose act no matter — not by mine. The President, the Senate, the House, 
and the country all said that there should be war. * * * j belonged to 
that school of politics which teaches that, when we are at war, the Government — 
I do not mean the Executive alone, but the Government — is entitled to demand 
and have, without resistance, such number of men, and such amount of money 
and supplies generally, as may be necessary for the war, until an appeal can 
be had to the people. Before that tribunal alone, in the first instance, must 
the question of the continuance of the war be tried. This was Mr. Calhoun's 
opinion * * * j^ the Mexican War. Speaking of that war in 1847, ^^ 
said : " Every Senator knows that I was opposed to the war ; but none but 
myself knows the depth of that opposition. With my conception of its char- 
acter and consequences, it was impossible for me to vQte for jt. * * * But, 
after war was declared, by authority of the Government, I acquiesced in what 
I could not prevent, and what it was impossible for me to arrest ; and I then felt 
it to be my duty to limit my efifort to give such direction to the war as would, 
as far as possible, prevent the evils and dangers with which it threatened the 
country and its institutions." 

Sir, I adopt all this as my position and my defense, though, perhaps, in a 
civil war, I might fairly go further in opposition. I could not, with my con- 



232 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



victions, vote men and money for this war, and I would not, as a Representa- 
tive, vote against them. I meant that, without opposition, the President might 
take all the men and all the money he should demand, and then to hold him to 
a strict responsibility before the people for the results. Not believing the sol- 
diers responsible for the war or its purposes or its consequences, I have never 
withheld my vote where their separate interests were concerned. But I have 
denounced from the beginning the usurpations and the infractions, one and 
all, of law and Constitution, by the President and those under him ; their 
repeated and persistent arbitrary arrests, the suspension of habeas corpus, the 
violation of freedom of the mails, of the private house, of the press, and of 
speech, and all the other multiplied wrongs and outrages upon public liberty and 
private right, which have made this country one of the worst despotisms on 
earth for the past twenty months; and I will continue to rebuke and denounce 
them to the end ; and the people, thank God, have at last heard and heeded, and 
rebuked them too. To the record and to time I appeal again for my justifi- 
cation. 

(Delivered in the House of Representatives, January 14, 1863.) 



J^J^^^!i^-i _^- 





THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS. 233 



The Gettysburg Address. 

By ABRAHAM LINCOLN, of Illinois. 

(Born 1809, died 1865.) 



^5 OURSCORE AND SEVEN years ago our fathers brought forth upon 
this continent a new nation, conceived in Hberty, and dedicated to 
the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged 
in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so 
conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a 
great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of 
that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that 
nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. 
But in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow 
this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have con- 
secrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world will little note, 
nor long remember, what we say here; but it can never forget what they did 
here. It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work 
which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for 
us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us, that from these 
honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the 
last full measure of devotion ; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall 
not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of 
freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, 
shall not perish from the earth. 

(Delivered at the battlefield, November 19, 1863.) 




234 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Peace. 



By JAMES A. GARFIELD, of Ohio. 

(Born 1831, died 1881.) 

R. CHAIRMAN: I should be obliged to you if you would direct the 
Sergeant-at-Arms to bring a white flag and plant it in the aisle 
between myself and my colleague who has just addressed you. 

I recollect on one occasion when two great armies stood face to 

face, that under a white flag just planted, I approached a company 

of men dressed in the uniform of the rebel Confederacy, and reached 

out my hand to one of the number, and told him I respected him as a brave 

man. Though he wore the emblems of disloyalty and treason, still, underneath 

his vestments I beheld a brave and honest soul. 

I would produce that scene here this afternoon. I say, were there such a 
flag of truce — but God forbid me if I should do it under any other circum- 
stances — I would reach out this right hand and ask that gentleman to take it ; 
because I honor his bravery and his honesty. I believe what has just fallen 
from his lips are the honest sentiments of his heart, and in uttering it he has 
made a new epoch in the history of this war ; he has done a new thing under the 
sun ; he has done a brave thing. It is braver than to face cannon and musketry, 
and I honor him for his candor and frankness. 

But now, I ask you to take away the flag of truce ; and I will go back in- 
side the Union lines and speak of what he has done. I am reminded by it of a 
distinguished character in Paradise Lost. When he rebelled against the glory 
of God, and " led away a third part of Heaven's sons, conjured against the 
Highest; " when, after terrible battles in which mountains and hills were hurled 
down " nine times the space that measures day and night," and after the terrible 
fall lay stretched prone on the burning lake, — Satan lifted up his shattered bulk, 
crossed the abyss, looked down into Paradise, and, soliloquizing, said : " Which 
way I fly is Hell, myself am Hell;" it seems to me in that utterance he ex- 
pressed the very sentiments to which you have just listened; uttered by one 
not less brave, malign, and fallen. This man gathers up the meaning of this 




James A. Garfield. 



236 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

great contest, the philosophy of the moment, the prophecies of the hour, and, in 
sight of the paradise of victory and peace, utters them all in this wail of terrible 
despair, " Which way I fly is Hell." He ought add, " Myself am Hell." 

For the first time in the history of this contest, it is proposed in this hall 
to give up the struggle, to abandon the war, and let treason run riot through 
the land. I will, if I can, dismiss feeling from my heart and try to consider only 
what bears upon the logic of the speech to which we have just listened. 

First of all, the gentleman tells us that the right of secession is a con- 
stitutional right. I do not propose to enter into the argument. I have hitherto 
expressed myself on State sovereignty and State rights, of which this proposition 
of his is the legitimate child. 

He proposes to leave to the United States a territory reaching from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific, and one hundred miles wide in the center. From Wells- 
ville on the Ohio to Cleveland on the lakes is one hundred miles. I ask you, 
Mr. Chairman, if there be a man here so insane as to suppose that the American 
people will allow their magnificent national proportions to be shorn to so de- 
formed a shape as this? 

Suppose the policy of the gentleman were adopted to-day. Let the order 
go forth ; sound the " recall " on your bugles, and let it ring from Texas to 
the far Atlantic, and tell the armies to come back. Call the victorious legions 
back over the battlefield of blood forever now disgraced. Call them back over 
the territory which they have conquered. Call them back, and let the minions 
of secession chase them with derision and jeers as they come. And then tell 
them that the man across the aisle, from the free State of Ohio, gave birth to 
the monstrous proposition. 

Mr. Chairman, if such a word should be sent forth through the armies of 
the Union, the wave of terrible vengeance that would sweep back over this land 
could never find a parallel in the records of history. Almost in the moment of 
final victory, the " recall " is sounded by a craven people not desiring freedom. 
We ought, every man, to be made a slave should we sanction such a sentiment. 

The gentleman has told us there is no such thing as coercion justifiable 
under the Constitution. I ask him for one moment to reflect, that no statute 
ever was enforced without coercion. It is the basis of every law in the universe, — 
God's law as well as man's. A law is no law without coercion behind it. When 
a man has murdered his brother, coercion takes the murderer, tries him, and 
hangs him. When you levy your taxes, coercion secures their collection; it 
follows the shadow of the thief and brings him to justice ; it accompanies your 
diplomacy to foreign courts, and backs a declaration of the nation's right by a 
pledge of the nation's power. * * * 



I 



PEACE. 



237 



What is the Constitution that these gentlemen are perpetually flinging in 
our faces whenever we desire to strike hard blows against the rebellion? It is 
the production of the American people. They made it ; and the creator is 
mightier than the creature. The power which made the Constitution can also 
make other instruments to do its great work in the day of dire necessity. 

(Being part of a speech in the House of Representatives, April 8, 1864.) 





238 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Lincoln's Second Inaugural Address. 

By ABRAHAM LINCOLN, of Illinois. 

(Born 1809, died 1865.) 



ELLOW COUNTRYMEN : At this second appearing to take the 
oath of the Presidential office, there is less occasion for an extended 
address than there was at first. Then a statement, somewhat in detail, 
of a course to be pursued, seemed very fitting- and proper. Now, at 
the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have 
been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great 
contest which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, 
little that is new could be presented. 

The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well 
known to the public as to myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and 
encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to 
it is ventured. 

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago, all thoughts were 
anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it, all sought to avoid 
it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted 
altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city 
seeking to destroy it with war — seeking to dissolve the Union and divide the 
effects by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war, but one of them would 
make war rather than let the nation survive, and the other would accept war 
rather than let it perish ; and the war came. One-eighth of the whole population 
were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in 
the Southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful in- 
terest. All knew that this interest was somehow the cause of the war. To 
strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which the 
insurgents would rend the Union by war, while the Government claimed no 
right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it. 

Neither party expected for the war the magnitud or the duration which 
it has already attained. Neither anticipated that the cause of the conflict might 
cease when, or even before the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an 
easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the 



LINCOLN'S SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS. 



239 



same Bible and pray to the same God, and each invokes his aid against the 
other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just God's as- 
sistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us 
judge not, that we be not judged. The prayer of both could not be answered. 
That of neither has been answered fully. The Almighty has his own purposes. 
Woe unto the world because of ofifenses, for it must needs be that offenses 
come, but woe to that man by whom the ofifense cometh. If we shall suppose 
that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of God, 
must needs come, but which having continued through his appointed time, he 
now wills to remove, and that he gives to both North and South this terrible 
war as the woe due to those by whom the offense came — shall we discern there 
any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living God 
always ascribe to him? Fondly do we hope, fervently do we pray, that this 
mighty scourge of war may speedily pass away. Yet if God wills that it con- 
tinue until all the wealth piled by the bondsman's two hundred and fifty years 
of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the 
lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword; as was said three thousand 
years ago, so still it must be said, that the judgments of the Lord are true and 
righteous altogether. 

With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as 
God gives us to see the right, let us finish the work we are in, to bind up the 
nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his 
v.ddow and his orphans, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and a last- 
ing peace among ourselves and with all nations. 

(Delivered at Washington, March 4, 1865.) 





240 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Reconstruction. 



By HENRY WINTER DAVIS, of Maryland. 

(Born 1817, died 1865.) 



HAT is the nature of this case with which we have to deal, the evil we 
must remedy, the danger we must avert? In other words, what is that 
monster of political wrong which is called secession? It is not, Mr. 
Speaker, domestic violence, within the meaning of that clause of the 
Constitution; for the violence was the act of the people of those 
States through their Governments, and was the offspring of their 
free and unforced will. It is not invasion, in the meaning of the Constitution; 
for no State has been invaded against the will of the Government of the 
State by any power except the E^nited States marching to overthrow 
the usurpers of its territory. It is, therefore, the act of the people of the States, 
carrying with it all the consequences of such an act. And, therefore, it must 
be either a legal revolution, which makes them independent, and makes of the 
United States a foreign country; or it is a usurpation against the authority of 
the United States, the erection of Governments which do not recognize the 
Constitution of the United States, which the Constitution does not recognize, 
and, therefore, not republican governments of the States in rebellion. The latter 
is the view which all parties take of it. I do not understand that any gentleman 
on the other side of the House says that any rebel Government which does not 
recognize the Constitution of the United States, and which is not recognized 
by Congress, is a State Government within the meaning of the Constitution. 
Still less can it be said that there is a State Government, republican or unrepub- 
lican, in the State of Tennessee, where there is no Government of any kind, 
no civil authority, no organized form of administration except that represented 
by the flag of the United States, obeying the will and under the orders of the 
military officer in command. * * * Those that are here represented are the 
only Governments existing within the limits of the United States. Those that 
are not here represented are not Governments of the States, republican under 




Henry Winter Davis. 



242 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

the Constitution. And if they be not, then they are mihtary usurpations, inau- 
gurated as the permanent Governments of the States, contrary to the supreme 
law of the land, arrayed in arms against the Government of the United States ; 
and it is the duty, the first and highest duty, of the Government to suppress 
and expel them. Congress must either expel or recognize and support them. 
If it does not guarantee them, it is bound to expel them ; and they who are not 
ready to suppress are bound to recognize them. 

We are now engaged in suppressing a military usurpation of the authority 
of the State Governments. When that shall have been accomplished, there will 
be no form of State authority in existence which Congress can recognize. Our 
success will be the overthrow of all semblance of government in the rebel 
States. The Government of the United States is then, in fact, the only govern- 
ment existing in those States, and it is there charged to guarantee them repub- 
lican governments. 

What jurisdiction does the duty of guaranteeing a republican government 
confer under such circumstances upon Congress? What right does it give? 
What laws may it pass? What objects may it accomplish? What conditions 
may it insist upon, and what judgment may it exercise in determining what it 
will do? The duty of guaranteeing carries with it the right to pass all laws 
necessary and proper to guarantee. The duty of guaranteeing means the duty 
to accomplish the result. It means that the republican government shall exist. 
It means that every opposition to republican government shall be put down. It 
means that everything inconsistent with the permanent continuance of repub- 
lican government shall be weeded out. It places in the hands of Congress to 
say what is and what is not — with all the light of experience and all the lessons 
of the past — inconsistent, in its judgment, with the permanent continuance of 
republican government ; and if, in its judgment, any forrn of policy is radically 
and inherently inconsistent with the permanent and enduring peace of the 
country, with the permanent supremacy of republican government — and it have 
the manliness to say so — there is no power, judicial or executive, in the United 
States that can even question this judgment of the people; and they can do it 
only by sending . other Representatives here to undo our work. The very 
language of the Constitution, and the necessary logic of the case, involve that 
consequence. The denial of the right of secession means that all the territory 
of the United States shall remain under the jurisdiction of the Constitution. 
If there can be no State Government which does not recognize the Constitution, 
and which the authorities of the United States do not recognize, then there are 
these alternatives, and these only: the rebel States must be governed by Con- 
gress till they submit and form a State Government under the Constitution ; ov 



RECONSTRUCTION. 243 

Congress must recognize State Governments which do not recognize either 
Congress or the Constitution of the United States ; or there must be an entire 
absence of all government in the rebel States — and that is anarchy. To recog- 
nize a Government which does not recognize the Constitution is absurd, for a 
Government is not a Constitution; and the recognition of a State Government 
means the acknowledgment of men as governors and legislators and judges, 
actually invested with power to make laws, to judge of crimes, to convict the 
citizens of other States, to demand the surrender of fugitives from justice, to 
arm and command the militia, to require the United States to repress all oppo- 
sition to its authority, and to protect it against invasion — against our own 
armies ; whose Senators and Representatives are entitled to seats in Congress, 
and whose electoral votes must be counted in the election of the President of a 
Government which they disown and defy. To accept the alternative of anarchy 
as the constitutional condition of a State is to assert the failure of the Constitu- 
tion and the end of republican government. Until, therefore. Congress recog- 
nize a State Government, organized under its auspices, there is no Government in 
the rebel States except the authority of Congress. * * * When military 
opposition shall have been suppressed, not merely paralyzed, driven into a cor- 
ner, pushed back, but gone, the horrid vision of civil war vanished from the 
South, then call upon the people to reorganize in their own way, subject to the 
conditions that we think essential to our permanent peace, and to prevent the 
revival hereafter of the rebellion — a republican government in the form that 
the people of the United States can agree to. 

Now, for that purpose there are three modes indicated. One is to remove 
the cause of the war by an alteration of the Constitution of the United States, 
prohibiting slavery everywhere within its limits. That, sir, goes to the root of 
the matter, and should consecrate the nation's triumph. But there are thirty- 
four States ; three-fourths of them would be twenty-six. I believe there are 
twenty-five States represented in this Congress ; so that we on that basis cannot 
change the Constitution. It is, therefore, a condition precedent in that view of 
the case that more States shall have governments organized within them. If it 
be assumed that the basis of calculation shall be three-fourths of the States now 
represented in Congress, I agree to that construction of the Constitution. =>= * * 
But, under any circumstances, even upon that basis it will be difficult to find 
three-fourths of the States — with New Jersey, or Kentucky, or Maryland, or 
Delaware, or other States that might be mentioned, opposed to it, under exist- 
ing auspices — to adopt such a clause of the Constitution after we shall have 
agreed to it. If adopted it still leaves all laws necessary to the ascertainment 
of the will of the people, and all restrictions on the return to power of the 



244 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

leaders of the rebellion, wholly unprovided for. The amendment of the Con- 
stitution meets my hearty approval, but it is not a remedy for the evils we must 
deal vv^ith. 

The next plan is that inaugurated by the President of the United States, in 
the proclamation of the eighth of December (1863), called the amnesty proclama- 
tion. That proposes no guardianship of the United States over the reorgani- 
zation of the Governments, no law to prescribe who shall vote, no civil func- 
tionaries to see that the law is faithfully executed, no supervising authority to 
control and judge of the election. But if in any manner by the toleration of 
martial law, lately proclaimed the fundamental law, under the dictation of any 
military authority, or under the prescription of a provost marshal, something 
in the form of a Government shall be presented, represented to rest on the votes 
of one-tenth of the population, the President will recognize that, provided it does 
not contravene the proclamation of freedom and the laws of Congress ; and to 
secure that an oath is exacted. There is no guaranty of law to watch over the 
organization of that Government. It may be recognized by the military power, 
and not recognized by the civil power, so that it would have a doubtful existence, 
half-civil and half-military, neither a temporary Government by law of Congress 
nor a State Government, something as unknown to the Constitution as the rebel 
Government that refuses to recognize it. The only prescription is that it shall 
not contravene the provisions of the proclamation. Sir, if that proclamation be 
valid, then we are relieved from all trouble on that score. But if that proclama- 
tion be not valid, then the oath to support it is without legal sanction, for the 
President can ask no man to bind himself by an oath to support an unfounded 
proclamation or an unconstitutional law even for a moment, still less after it 

shall have been declared void by the Supreme Court of the United States. 

».■■ * * 

By the bill we propose to preclude the judicial question by the solution of a 
political question. How so? By the paramount power of Congress to reorganize 
Governments in those States, to impose such conditions as it thinks necessary 
to secure the permanence of republican government, to refuse to recognize any 
Governments there which do not prohibit slavery forever. Aye, gentlemen, take 
the responsibility to say in the face of those who clamor for the speedy recogni- 
tion of Governments tolerating slavery, that the safety of the people of the United 
States is the supreme law; that their will is the supreme rule of law, and that 
we are authorized to pronounce their will on this subject. Take the responsibility 
to say that we will revise the judgments of our ancestors ; that we have experi- 
ence written in blood which they had not; that we find now what they darkly 
doubted, that slavery is really, radically inconsistent with the permanence of re- 



RECONSTRUCTION. 



245 



publican governments; and that being charged by the supreme law of the land 
on our conscience and judgment to guarantee, that is to continue, maintain, and 
enforce, if it exist, to institute and restore, when overthrown, republican govern- 
ment throughout the broad limits of the republic, we will weed out every element 
cf their policy which we think incompatible with its permanence and endurance. 
The purpose of the bill is to preclude the judicial question of the validity and 
effect of the President's proclamation by the decision of the political authority 
in reorganizing the State Governments. It makes the rule of decision the pro- 
visions of the State Constitution, which, when recognized by Congress, can be 
questioned in no court; and it adds to the authority of the proclamation the 
sanction of Congress. If gentlemen say that the Constitution does not bear 
that construction, we will go before the people of the United States on that 
question, and by their judgment we will abide. 

(Delivered in the House of Representatives, March 22, 1864,) 




246 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




The Mission of the Republic. 

By WILLIAM HENRY SEWARD, of New York. 

(Born 1801, died 1872.) 



E see only the rising of the sun of empire — only the fair seeds and 
beginnings of a great nation. Whether that glowing orb shall attain 
to a meridian height, or fall suddenly from its glorious sphere — 
whether those prolific seeds shall mature into autumnal ripeness, or 
shall perish, yielding no harvest — depends on God's will and provi- 
dence. But God's will and providence operate not by casualty or 
caprice, but by fixed and revealed laws. If we would secure the greatness set 
before us, we must find the way which those laws indicate, and keep within it. 
That way is new and all untried. We departed early — we departed at the 
beginning — from the beaten track of national ambition. Our lot was cast in 
an age of revolution — a revolution which was to bring all mankind from a 
state of servitude to the exercise of self-government — from under the tyranny 
of physical force to the gentle sway of opinion — from under subjection to 
matter to dominion over nature. 

It was ours to lead the way, to take up the cross of republicanism and bear 
it before the nations, to fight its earliest battles, to enjoy its earliest triumphs, 
to illustrate its purifying and elevating virtues, and by our courage and resolu- 
tion, our moderation and our magnanimity, to cheer and sustain its future fol- 
lowers through the baptism of blood and the martyrdom of fire. A mission so 
noble and benevolent demands a generous and self-denying enthusiasm. 

Our greatness is to be won by beneficence without ambition. We are in 
danger of losing that holy zeal. We are surrounded by temptations. Our 
dwellings become palaces, and our villages are transformed, as if by magic, into 
great cities. Fugitives from famine and oppression and the sword crowd our 
shores, and proclaim to us that we alone are free, and great, and happy. Ambi- 
tion for martial fame and the lust of conquest have entered the warm, living, 
30uthful heart of the Republic. Our empire enlarges. The castles of enemies 
fall before our advancing armies ; the gates of cities open to receive them. The 
continent and its islands seem ready to fall within our grasp, and more than 



THE MISSION OF THE REPUBLIC. 



247 



even fabulous wealth opens under our feet. No public virtue can withstand, 
none ever encountered, such seductions as these. Our own virtue and modera- 
tion must be renewed and fortified under circumstances so new and peculiar. 

Where shall we seek the influence adequate to a task so arduous as this? 
Shall we invoke the press and the desk? They only reflect the actual condition 
of the public morals, and cannot change them. 

Shall we resort to the executive authority? The time has passed when it 
could compose and modify the political elements around it. Shall we go to the 
Senate? Conspiracies, seditions, and corruptions, in all free countries, have 
begun there. Where, then, shall we go, to find an agency that can uphold and 
]-enovate declining public virtue? Where should we go, but there where all 
republican virtue begins and must end — where the Promethean fire is ever to 
be rekindled, until it shall finally expire — where motives are formed and pas- 
sions disciplined?- — to the domestic fireside and humble school, where the 
American citizen is trained. Instruct him there, that it will not be enough that 
he can claim for his country Lacedci?monian heroism, or even the Italian's 
boast, — 

" Terra potens atque ubere glehae," — 

but that more than Spartan valor and more than Roman magnificence is re- 
quired of her.- Go, then, ye laborers in a noble cause, gather the young Catholic 
and the young Protestant alike into the nursery of freedom ; and teach them 
there that, although religion has many and different shrines on which may be 
made the offering of a " broken spirit," which God will not despise, yet that 
their country has appointed only one altar and one sacrifice for all her sons, and 
that ambition and avarice must be slain on that altar, for it is consecrated to 
humanity. 

(Being part of an address.) 





248 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Impeachment of President Johnson, 

By BENJAMIN F. BUTLER, of New Hampshire. 

(Born 1818, died 1893.) 



'HE issue, then, finally, is this : that those utterances of his, in the manner 
and form in which they are alleged to have been made, and under the 
circumstances and at the time they were made, are decent and becom- 
ing the President of the United States, and do not tend to bring the 
office into ridicule and disgrace. 

We accept the issues. They are two : 
First. That he has the right to say what he did of Congress in the exercise 
of freedom of speech ; and, second, that what he did say in those speeches was 
a highly gentlemanlike and proper performance in a citizen, and still more 
becoming in a President of the United States. 

Let us first consider the graver matter of the assertion of the right to cast 
contumely upon Congress ; to denounce it as a " body hanging on the verge of 
the Government ; " " pretending to be a Congress when in fact it was not a 
Congress ; " "a Congress pretending to be for the Union when its every step 
and act tended to perpetuate disunion," " and make a disruption of the States 
inevitable;" "a Congress in a minority assuming to exercise power which, if 
allowed to be consummated, would result in despotism and monarchy itself ; " 
" a Congress which had done everything to prevent the union of the States ; " 
"a Congress factious and domineering;" "a radical Congress, which gave 
origin to another rebellion ; " "a. Congress upon whose skirts was every drop 
of blood that was shed in the New Orleans riots." 

You will find that these denunciations had a deeper meaning than mere 
expressions of opinion. It may be taken as an axiom in the afifairs of nations 
that no usurper has ever seized upon the Legislature of his country until he 
has familiarized the people with the possibility of so doing by vituperating and 
decrying it. Denunciatory attacks upon the Legislature have always preceded, 
slanderous abuse of the individuals composing it have always accompanied, a 
Seizure by a despot of the legislative power of a country. 




Benjamin F. Butler. 



250 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Two memorable examples in modern history will spring to the recollection 
of every man. Before Cromwell drove out by the bayonet the Parliament of 
England, he and his partisans had denounced it, derided it, decried it, and 
defamed it, and thus brought it into ridicule and contempt. He vilified it 
with the same name which it is a significant fact the partisans of Johnson, by 
a concerted cry, applied to the Congress of the United States when he com- 
menced his memorable pilgrimage and crusade against it. It is a still more 
significant fact that the justification made by Cromwell and by Johnson for 
setting aside the authority of Parliament and Congress, respectively, was pre- 
cisely the same, to wit : That they were elected by part of the people only. 
When Cromwell, by his soldiers, finally entered the hall of Parliament to dis- 
perse its members, he attempted to cover the enormity of his usurpation by de- 
nouncing this man personally as a libertine, that as a drunkard, another as 
the betrayer of the liberties of the people. Johnson started out on precisely the 
same course, but, forgetting the parallel, too early he proclaims this patriot 
an assassin, that statesman a traitor; threatens to hang that man whom the 
people delight to honor, and breathes out " threatenings and slaughter " against 
this man whose services in the cause of human freedom has made his name a 
household word wherever the language is spoken. There is, however, an ap- 
preciable difference between Cromwell and Johnson, and there is a like dif- 
ference in the results accomplished by each. 

When Bonaparte extinguished the Legislature of France, he waited until, 
through his press and his partisans, and by his own denunciations, he brought 
its authority into disgrace and contempt ; and when, finally, he drove the Coun- 
cil of the nation from their chanil^er. like Cromwell, he justified himself by per- 
sonal abuse of the individuals themselves as they passed bv him. 

That the attempt of Andrew Johnson to overthrow Congress has failed, is 
because of the want of ability and power, not of malignity and will. 

(From a speech delivered at the trial, March 30, 1868.) 





THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT. 251 



The Fifteenth Amendment. 

By FRANCIS P. BLAIR, of Virginia. 

(Born 1791, died 1876.) 



AVE we a Federal Union on the constitutional basis ? Are the States 
equal in political rights? Is the Central Government acting within 
constitutional limitations ? What is this whole system of reconstruc- 
tion, as it is called ; this exclusion of States from their inherent and 
guaranteed rights. Taxation without representation, their funda- 
mental laws set aside, the popular will suppressed, the right of suf- 
frage taken from the States by a usurping fragment of Congress, the Federal 
Constitution itself changed in its character by the same usurping fragment, and, 
in defiance of the known and expressed will of the people, the Government is 
literally, practically subverted, and the paramount issue now is to bring back 
the Central Government to its legitimate powers, and the restoration of the States 
to their reserved and undoubted rights, instead of expending argument and 
effort on minor questions of expediency, touching the afTairs of finance, and 
free trade, questions which will become great and important when we shall have 
succeeded in rescuing the Government itself from the perils which threaten its 
existence. Democrats may honestly differ on these minor matters, and so 
may radicals. But on the subject of a consolidated empire or a Federal Union 
there can be no division among those who prefer the one or the other system. 
If the central reconstrvict them, displace the duly-elected authorities chosen 
by the people, and put others in their places by edicts to be executed by the 
military arm, then we are under a consolidated government without limitation 
of power. Such has been, and is, the action of Congress and of the administra- 
tion of General Grant. * * * 

The Senator has gone somewhat into the history of the Fifteenth Amend- 
ment, the rightful adoption of which is controverted by his State in the concur- 
rent resolutions passed by the Legislature of Indiana, and which are now under 
consideration by the Senate. I shall also refer to some historical matters per- 
taining to that measure, I remember very well that the Congress which pro- 



252 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

posed that amendment to the States failed to do so until the presidential election, 
and that their nominating convention, which sat in Chicago, held out the promise 
to the people that no such amendment should be proposed, declaring in emphatic 
terms that, while they claimed the right to regulate the suffrage by Congress 
in the States lately in revolt, the States that had not been in rebellion should 
have, and of right ought to have, the power to regulate suffrage for themselves. 
This was a trick to avoid an issue, which would have been fatal to them in the 
presidential election. But when, after the election, the party to which the Senator 
belongs had secured another lease of power, they then proposed to the States 
this amendment, refusing and voting down a proposition made, I think, in both 
houses of Congress, certainly in one of the houses, that the amendment should 
be submitted to Legislatures of the States, elected after the amendment was 
submitted by Congress to the States for ratification. This was promptly refused. 
They did not intend that the people should have anything to do with framing 
their own organic law. This measure, the Senator declares, had become " a 
political necessity " for his party, and could not be trusted to the people. 

What further? The two Senators who sat here from my own State, neither 
of whom sit here now, voted for this amendment after the people of Missouri, in 
the election immediately preceding, had voted down negro suffrage by thirty 
thousand majority, and the Legislature, elected by that very vote, ratified the 
amendment, in defiance of this overwhelming expression of public sentiment. 

A similar state of facts occurred in Kansas, where, in the election preceding, 
negro suffrage had been defeated by fifteen thousand majority. In the State of 
Ohio the majority against negro suffrage was fifty thousand, and yet her Repub- 
lican Senators and Representatives, and her Republican Legislature, promptly 
disregarded the public will by proposing and ratifying this amendment. In the 
State of Michigan the people refused to give suffrage to the negroes by a 
majority of thirty-four thousand. Her Senators and Representatives were 
equally regardless of the wishes of their people, and hastened to fasten upon 
them an organic law for which they had proclaimed their detestation. I could 
go on and enumerate many more of the Northern States, in which the people 
had expressed their will with equal emphasis, and were treated with equal con- 
tempt by their Republican Senators and Representatives. Among the number 
were the States of New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey; and, indeed, I 
think that none of the Northern States can be excepted — not one ! 

Now, sir, I do not know a single Northern State outside of New England 
in which the people whenever the question has been submitted to them, have not 
rejected the proposition to allow negro suffrage ; and yet these gentlemen hur- 
ried the matter through without a constitutional quorum in the State of the 




Francis P. Blair. 



254 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Senator from Indiana, and in my State, after the people had condemned it by 
tliirty thousand majority six months previous, the radical Legislature adopted 
one-half of it on a telegram, not waiting to receive an official and authentic copy, 
such was their haste to show contempt for the popular will of the State. 

Then the question is raised by the State of Indiana in these resolutions in 
reference to the ratification of Virginia, Mississippi, Texas, and Georgia, without 
the ratification of which States the amendment was not adopted. If adopted at 
all, we have seen that it was adopted against the remonstrance of all the people 
of the North, and simply by coercion in the States of the South ; and yet that 
amendment is now to be considered as one of those sacred things upon which 
no man must lay his hands. Because the perfidious representatives of the 
people have betrayed their trust and fixed a yoke upon their necks, they are 
not to wince when they are galled ; and if some States, by a fraud obtaining the 
signatures of the presiding officers of the two Houses, enact into a law that which 
they had no right to enact, and contrary to the forms ordained in their own 
Constitution, we have no right to examine it or hold to proper accountability 
those who have committed fraud and ]:)erverted the forms of law to give efYect 
to their crime. 

Sir, if constitutional amendments can be adopted in that way we might well 
have constitutional amendments here that would create what the gentleman 
pretends so much to apprehend. If constitutional amendments can be adopted 
in this mode, against the remonstrance of the entire body of the people of the 
North, or a vast majority of them, as indicated by the facts to which I have 
referred, and which are not contradicted in the Senate, and cannot be contra- 
dicted, why may we not soon have one declared adopted which provides for a 
President and Senate for life, and why may not other aristocratic and mon- 
archical institutions be fixed upon us by coercing these carpet-bag States, or, 
ill the congressional slang, requiring 'them to adopt another fundamental con- 
dition, and by misrepresenting and defying the will of the people in the States 
of the North? And then we shall be told, in the language of the Senator, that 
we have no right to say a word ; we have no right even to expose the perfidy 
by which the people have been betrayed ; and we shall be denounced as revolu- 
tionists if we do. 

This is no idle apprehension. Each day ushers in some new and monstrous 
usurpation of power on the part of the dominant party. One aggression is 
but the stepping-stone of another. The indignation excited by each successive 
infringement of the rights of the people is a pretext for still further encroach- 
ments. The plea of " political necessity," by which the Senator justifies the 
adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment, is always ready, and has become the 



THE FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT. 



255 



law of the existence of that party which, having forfeited the confidence of the 
people, is now compelled to retain power by fraud and force. Hence the bill to 
employ the Army to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment, which has grown out of 
that measure, and the bill now pending in the other House enlarging the powers 
of the President for the same purpose. It is the fungus growth from a rotten 
system, more poisonous than that which produced it. 

(From a speech in the United States Senate, February 15, 1871.) 




256 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Abraham Lincoln. 

By FREDERICK DOUGLASS, of Maryland. 

(Born 1817, died 1895.) 




HAVE been down there to see the President; and as you were 
not there, perhaps you may like to know how the President of 
the United States received a black man at the White House. I 
will tell you how he received me — just as you have seen one gentle- 
man receive another:" (great applause) "with a hand and a voice 
well-balanced between a kind cordiality and a respectful reserve. I 
tell you I felt big there." (Laughter.) " Let me tell you how I got to him; 
because everybody can't get to himi. He has to be a little guarded in admitting 
spectators. The manner of getting to him gave me an idea that the cause was 
rolling on. The stairway was crowded with applicants. Some of them looked 
eager; and I have no doubt some of them had a purpose in being there, and 
wanted to see the President for the good of the country. They were white; 
and as I was the only dark spot among them, I expected to have to wait at least 
half a day; I had heard of men waiting a week; but in two minutes after I sent 
in my card, the messenger came out. and respectfully invited ' Mr. Douglass ' in. 
I could hear, in the eager multitude outside as they saw me pressing and elbow- 
ing my way through, the remark, ' yes, d — n it, I knew they would let the nigger 
through,' in a kind of despairing voice — a Peace Democrat, I suppose." 
(Laughter.) " When I went in, the President was sitting in his usual position, 
I was told, with his feet in different parts of the room, taking it easy." (Laughter.) 
" Don't put this down, Mr. Reporter, I pray you ; for I am going down there 
again to-morrow." (Laughter.) " As I came in and approached him, the 
President began to rise," (laughter) '' and he continued rising, until he stood 
over me;" (laughter) " and reaching out his hand, he said, ' Mr. Douglass, I 
know you; I have read about you, and Mr. Seward has told me about you;' 
putting me quite at ease at once. 

" Now, you will want to know how I was impressed by him. I will tell 
you that, too. He impressed me as being just what every one of you have 
been in the habit of calling him — an honest man." (Applause.) " I have never 




Frederick Douglass. 



258 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

met with a man who, on the first blush, impressed me more entirely with his 
sincerity, with his devotion to his country, and with his determination to save 
it at all hazards." (Applause.) " He told me (I think he did me more honor 
than I deserve), that I had made a little speech somewhere in New York, and it 
had got into the papers, and among the things I had said was this: that if I 
were called upon to state what I regarded as the most sad and most dishearten- 
ing features in our present political and military situation, it would not be the 
various disasters experienced by our armies and our navies, on flood and field, 
but it would be the tardy, hesitating, vacillating policy of the President of the 
United States. And the President said to me, ' Mr. Douglass, I have been 
charged with being tardy, and the like;' and he went on, and partly admitted 
that he might seem slow; but he said: ' I am charged with vacillating; but, Mr. 
Douglass, I do not think that charge can be sustained; I think it cannot be 
shown that when I have once taken a position I have ever retreated from it.' " 
(Applause.) " That I regarded as the most significant point in what he said 
during our interview. I told him that he had been somewhat slow in proclaim- 
ing ecjual protection to our colored soldiers and prisoners; and he said that 
the country needed talking up to that point. He hesitated in regard to it, when 
he felt that the country was not ready for it. He knew that the colored man 
throughout this country was a despised man, a hated man, and that if he at 
first came out with such a proclamation, all the hatred which is poured on 
the head of the negro race would be visited on his administration. He said 
that there was preparatory work needed, and that that preparatory work had 
now been done. And he said, ' Remember this, Mr. Douglass; remember that 
Milliken's Bend, Port Hudson, and Fort Wagner are recent events; and that 
these were necessary to prepare the way for this very proclamation of mine.' 
I thought it was reasonable, but came to the conclusion that while Abraham 
Lincoln will not go down to posterity as Abraham the Great, or as Abraham 
the Wise, or as Abraham the Eloquent, although he is all three — wise, great, 
and eloquent, he will go down to posterity, if the country is saved, as Honest 
Abraham;" (applause) "and going down thus, his name may be written any- 
where in this wide world of ours, side by side with that of Washington, without 
disparaging the latter." (Renewed applause.) 

(Delivered in Philadelphia in 1863.) 




THE REMONETIZATION OF SILVER. 259 



The Remonetization of Silvero 

By JAMES Q. BLAINE, of Maine. 

(Born 1830, died 1893.) 



^HE discussion on the question of remonetizing silver, Mr. President, has 
been prolonged, able, and exhaustive. I may not expect to add much 
to its value, but I promise not to add much to its length. I shall en- 
deavor to consider facts rather than theories, to state conclusions rather 
than arguments : 

First. I believe gold and silver coin to be the money of the Con- 
Ftitution — indeed, the money of the American people anterior to the Constitu- 
tion, which that great organic law recognized as quite independent of its own 
existence. No power was conferred on Congress to declare that either metal 
should not ,be money. Congress has, therefore, in my judgment, no power to 
demonetize silver any more than to demonetize gold ; no power to demonetize 
either any more than to demonetize both. In this statement I am but repeating 
the weighty dictum of the first of constitutional lawyers. " I am certainly of 
opinion," said Mr. Webster, " that gold and silver, at rates fixed by Congress, 
constitute the legal standard of value in this country, and that neither Congress 
nor any State has authority to establish any other standard or to displace this 
standard." Few persons can be found, I apprehend, who will maintain that 
Congress possesses the power to demonetize both gold and silver, or that Con- 
gress could be justified in prohibiting the coinage of both ; and yet in logic and 
legal construction it would be difficult to show where and wdiy the power of 
Congress over silver is greater than over gold — greater over either than, over 
the two. If, therefore, silver has been demonetized, I am in favor of remonetiz- 
ing it. If its coinage has been prohibited, I am in favor of ordering it to be 
resumed. If it has been restricted, I am in favor of having it enlarged. 

Second. What power, then, has Congress over gold and silver? It has 
the exclusive power to coin them ; the exclusive power to regulate their value ; 
very great, very wise, very necessary powers^ for the discreet exercise of which 
a critical occasion has now arisen. However men may differ about causes and 
processes, all will admit that within a few years a great disturbance has taken 



26o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

place in the relative values of gold and silver, and that silver is worth less or 
gold is worth more in the money markets of the world in 1878 than in 1873, 
when the further coinage of silver dollars was prohibited in this country. To 
remonetize it now as though the facts and circumstances of that day were sur- 
rounding us, is to willfully and blindly deceive ourselves. If our demonetiza- 
tion were the only cause for the decline in the value of silver, then remoneti- 
zation would be its proper and effectual cure. But other causes, quite beyond 
our control, have been far more potentially operative than the simple fact of 
Congress prohibiting its further coinage ; and as legislators we are bound to 
take cognizance of these causes. The demonetization of silver in the great 
German Empire and the consequent partial, or well-nigh complete, suspension 
of coinage in the Governments of the Latin Union, have been the leading 
dominant causes for the rapid decline in the value of silver. I do not think 
the over-supply of silver has had, in comparison with these other causes, an 
appreciable influence in the decline of its value, because its over-supply with 
respect to gold in these later years, has not been nearly so great as was the 
over-supply of gold with respect to silver for many years after the mines of 
California and Australia were opened ; and the over-supply of gold from those 
rich sources did not affect the relative positions and uses of the two metals in 
any European country. 

I believe then if Germany were to remonetize silver and the Kingdoms 
and States of the Latin Union were to reopen their mints, silver would at once 
resume its former relation with gold. The European countries when driven 
to full remonetization, as I believe they will be, must of necessity adopt their 
old ratio of fifteen and a half of silver to one of gold, and we shall^ then be 
compelled to adopt the same ratio instead of our former sixteen to one. For 
if we fail to do this we shall, as before, lose our silver, which like all things 
else seeks the highest market ; and if fifteen and a half pounds of silver will 
buy as much gold in Europe as sixteen pounds will buy in America, the silver, 
of course, will go to Europe. But our line of policy in a joint movement with 
other nations to remonetize is very simple and very direct. The difficult prob- 
lem is what we shall do when we aim to re-establish silver without the co-opera- 
tion of European powers, and really as an advance movement to coerce them 
there into the same policy. Evidently the first dictate of prudence is to coin 
such a dollar, as will not only do justice among our citizens at home, but will 
prove a protection — an absolute barricade — against the gold monometal- 
lists of Europe, who, whenever the opportunity ofifers, will quickly draw from 
us the one hundred and sixty millions of gold coin still in our midst. And 
if we coin a silver dollar of full legal tender, obviously below the current value 




James G. Blaine. 



262 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of the gold dollar, we are opening wide our doors and inviting Europe to take 
our gold. And with our gold flowing out from us we are forced to the single 
silver standard and our relations with the leading commercial countries of the 
world are at once embarrassed and crippled. 

Third. The question before Congress then — sharply defined in the pend- 
ing House bill — is, whether it is now safe and expedient to offer free coinage 
to the silver dollar of four hundred and twelve and one-half grains, with the 
mints of the Latin Union closed and Germany not permitting silver to be coined 
as money. At current rates of silver, the free coinage of a dollar containing 
four hundred and twelve and one-half grains, worth in gold about ninety-two 
cents, gives an illegitimate profit to the owner of the bullion, enabling him to 
take ninety-two cents' worth of it to the mint and get it stamped as coin and 
force his neighbor to take it for a full dollar. This is an undue and unfair 
advantage which the Government has no right to give to the owner of silver 
bullion, and which defrauds the man who is forced to take the dollar. And 
it assuredly follows that if we give free coinage to this dollar of inferior value 
and put it in circulation, we do so at the expense of our better coinage in 
gold ; and unless we expect the uniform and invariable experience of other 
nations to be in some mysterious way suspended for our peculiar benefit, we 
inevitably lose our gold coin. It will flow out from us with the certainty and 
resistless force of the tides. * * * 

Fifth. The responsibility of re-establishing silver in its ancient and hon- 
orable place as money in Europe and America, devolves really on the Con- 
gress of the United States. If we act here with prudence, wisdom, and firm- 
ness, we shall not only successfully remonetize silver and bring it into general 
use as money in our own country, but the influence of our example will be 
potential among all European nations, with the possible exception of Eng- 
land. Indeed, our annual indebtment to Europe is so great that if we have 
the right to pay it in silver we necessarily coerce those nations by the strong- 
est of all forces, self-interest, to aid us in upholding the value of silver as 
money. But if we attempt the remonetization on a basis which is obviously 
and notoriously below the fair standard of value as it now exists, we incur 
all the evil consequences of failure at home and the positive certainty of suc- 
cessful opposition abroad. We are and shall be the greatest producers of silver 
in the world, and wc have a larger stake in its complete monetization than any 
other country. The difference to the United States between the general 
acceptance of silver as money in the commercial .world and its destruction as 
money, will possibly equal within the next half-century the entire bonded debt 
of the nation. But to gain this advantage we must make it actual money — 



THE REMONETIZATION OF SILVER. 263 

the accepted equal of gold in the markets of the world. Remonetization here 
followed by general remonetization in Europe will secure to the United States 
the most stable basis for its currency that we have ever enjoyed, and will 
efifectually aid in solving all the problems by which our financial situation is 
surrounded. 

Sixth. On the much-vexed and long-mooted question of a bimetallic or 
monometallic standard my own views are sufficiently indicated in the remarks 
I have made. I believe the struggle now going on in this country and in 
other countries for a single gold standard would, if successful, produce wide- 
spread disaster in the end throughout the commercial world. The destruction 
of silver as money and establishing gold as the sole unit of value must have a 
ruinous efifect on all forms of property except those investments which yield 
a fixed return in money. These would be enormously enhanced in value, and 
would gain a disproportionate and unfair advantage over every other species 
of property. If, as the most reliable statistics affirm, there are nearly seven 
thousand millions of coin or bullion in the world, not very unequally divided 
between gold and silver, it is impossible to strike silver out of existence as 
money without results wdiich will prove distressing to millions and utterly dis- 
astrous to tens of thousands. Alexander Hamilton, in his able and invaluable 
report in 1791 on the establishment of a mint, declared that " to annul the use 
of either gold or silver as money is to abridge the quantity of circulating 
m.edium, and is liable to all the objections which arise from a comparison of 
the benefits of a full circulation with the evils of a scanty circulation." I take 
no risk in saying that the benefits of a full circulation and the evils of a scanty 
circulation are both immeasurably greater to-day than they were when Mr. 
Hamilton uttered these weighty words, always provided that the circulation 
is one of actual money, and not of depreciated promises to pay. * * * 

Seventh. The question of beginning anew the coinage of silver dollars 
has aroused much discussion as to its effect on the public credit; and the 
Senator from Ohio (Mr. Matthews) placed this phase of the subject in the 
very forefront of the debate — insisting, prematurely and illogically, I think, 
on a sort of judicial construction in advance, by concurrent resolution, of a 
certain law in case that law should happen to be passed by Congress. My 
own view on this question can be stated very briefly. I believe the public 
creditor can afford to be paid in any silver dollar that the United States can 
afford to coin and circulate. We have forty thousand millions of property in 
this country, and a wise self-interest will not permit us to overturn its relations 
by seeking for an inferior dollar wherewith to settle the dues and demands of 
any creditor. The question might be different from a merely selfish stand- 



264 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

point if, on paying the dollar to the public creditor, it would disappear after 
performing that function. But the trouble is that the inferior dollar you pay 
the public creditor remains in circulation, to the exclusion of the better dollar. 
That which you pay at home will stay there ; that which you send abroad will 
come back. The interest of the public creditor is indissolubly bound up with 
the interest of the whole people. Whatever affects him affects us all ; and the 
evil that we might inflict upon him by paying an inferior dollar would recoil 
upon us with a vengeance as manifold as the aggregate wealth of the Republic 
transcends the comparatively small limits of our bonded debt. * * * 

But I must say, Mr. President, that the specific demand for the payment 
of our bonds in gold coin and in nothing else, comes with an ill grace from 
certain quarters. European criticism is leveled against us and hard names 
are hurled at us across the ocean, for simply daring to state that the letter of 
our law declares the bonds to be payable in standard coin of July 14, 1870; 
expressly and explicitly declared so, and declared so in the interest of the pub- 
lic creditor, and the declaration inserted in the very body of the eight hundred 
million of bonds that have been issued since that date. Beyond all doubt the 
silver dollar was included in the standard coins of that public act. Payment 
at that time would have been as acceptable and as undisputed in silver as in 
gold dollars, for both were equally valuable in the European as well as in the 
American market. Seven-eighths of all our bonds, owned out of the country, 
are held in Germany and in Holland, and Germany has demonetized silver 
and Holland has been forced thereby to suspend its coinage, since the subjects of 
both powers purchased our securities. The German Empire, the very year after 
we made our specific declaration for paying our bonds in coin, passed a law 
destroying so far as lay in their power the value of silver as money. I do not 
say that it was specially aimed at this country, but it was passed regardless of 
its effect upon us, and was followed, according to public and undenied state- 
ment, by a large investment on the part of the German Government in our 
bonds, with a view, it was understood, of holding them as a coin reserve for 
drawing gold from us to aid in establishing their gold standard at home. Thus, 
by one move the German Government destroyed, so far as lay in its power, 
the then existing value of silver as money, enhanced consequently the value 
of gold, and then got into position to draw gold from us at the moment of 
their need, which would also be the moment of our own sorest dis- 
tress. * * * 

The effect of paying the labor of this country in silver coin of full value, 
as compared with the irredeemable paper or as compared even with silver of 
inferior value, will make itself felt in a single generation to the extent of tens 



THE REMONETIZATION OF SILVER. 265 

of millions, perhaps hundreds of millions, in the aggregate savings which rep- 
resent consolidated capital. It is the instinct of man from the savage to the 
scholar — developed in childhood and remaining with age — to value the metals 
which in all tongues are called precious. Excessive paper money leads to 
extravagance, to waste, and to want, as we painfully witness on all sides to-day. 
And in the midst of the proof of its demoralizing and destructive effect, we 
hear it proclaimed in the Halls of Congress that " the people demand cheap 
money." I deny it. I declare such a phrase to be a total misapprehension, 
a total misinterpretation of the popular wish. The people do not demand 
cheap money. They demand an abundance of good money, which is an 
entirely dififerent thing. They do not want a single gold standard that will 
exclude silver and benefit those already rich. They do not want an inferior 
silver standard that will drive out gold and not help those already poor. They 
want both metals, in full value, in equal honor, in whatever abundance the 
bountiful earth will yield them to the searching eye of science and to the hard, 
hand of labor. 

The two metals have existed side by side in harmonious, honorable com- 
panionship as money, ever since intelligent trade was known among men. It 
is well-nigh forty centuries since " Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver 
which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth — four hundred shekels 
of silver — current money with the merchant." Since that time nations have 
risen and fallen, races have disappeared, dialects and languages have been for- 
gotten, arts have been lost, treasures have perished, continents have been dis- 
covered, islands have been sunk in the sea, and through all these ages and 
through all these changes, silver and gold have reigned supreme, as the repre- 
sentatives of value, as the media of exchange. The dethronement of each has 
been attempted in turn, and sometimes the dethronement of both ; but always 
in vain. And we are here to-day, deliberating anew over the problem which 
comes down to us from Abraham's time : the weight of the silver that shall be 
" current money with the merchant." 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, February 7, 1878.) 




266 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Remonetization of Silver. 

By JUSTIN S. MORRILL, of Vermont. 

(Born 1810, died 1898.) 



R. PRESIDENT, the bill now before the Senate provides for the 
resuscitation of the obsolete dollar of four hundred and twelve and 
one-half grains of silver, which Congress entombed in 1834 by an 
act which diminished the weight of gold coins to the extent of six 
and six-tenths per cent., and thus bade a long farewell to silver. It 
is to be a dollar made of metal worth now fifty-three and five-eighths 
pence per ounce, or ten cents less in value than a gold dollar, and on January 
23d, awkwardly enough, worth eight and three-fourths cents less than a dollar 
in greenbacks, gold being only one and one-quarter per cent, premium, but, 
nevertheless, to be a legal tender for all debts, public and private, except where 
otherwise provided by contract. The words seem to be aptly chosen to over- 
ride and annul whatever now may be otherwise provided by law. Beyond 
this, as the bill came from the House, the holders of silver bullion — not the 
Government or the whole people — were to have all the profits of coinage and 
the Government all of the expense. * * * 

The bill, if it becomes a law, must at the very threshold arrest the resump- 
tion of specie payments, for, were the holders of United States notes suddenly 
willing to exchange them for much less than their present value, payment even 
in silver is to be postponed indefinitely. For years United States notes have 
been slowly climbing upward, but now they are to have a sudden plunge down- 
ward, and in every incompleted contract, great and small, the robbery of Peter 
to pay Paul is to be foreordained. The whole measure looks to me like a 
fearful assault upon the public credit. The losses it will inflict upon the hold- 
ers of paper money and many others will be large, and if the bill, without fur- 
ther radical amendments, obtains the approval of the Senate, it will give the 
death-blow to the cardinal policy of the country, which now seeks a large 
reduction of the rate of interest upon our national debt. Even that portion 
now held abroad will come back in a stampede to be exchanged for gold at 
any sacrifice. The ultimate result would be, when the supply for customs 









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Justin S. Morrill. 



268 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

shall have been coined and the first effervescence has passed away, the emis- 
sion of silver far below the standard of gold; and when the people become 
tired of it, disgusted or ruined by its instability, as they soon would be, a fresh 
clamor may be expected for the remonetization of gold, and another clipping 
or debasing of gold coins may follow to bring them again into circulation on 
the basis of silver equivalency. In this slippery descent there can be no stop- 
ping place. The consoling philosophy of the silver commission may then be 
repealed, that a fall in the value of either or both of the metals is a " benefac- 
tion to mankind." If that were true, then copper, being more abundant and 
of lower value, should be used in preference to either gold or silver. The 
gravity of these questions will not be disputed. * * * 

If any have silver to sell it is comparatively a small matter, and yet we 
earnestly desire that they may obtain for it the highest as well as the most 
stable price ; but not at the expense of corn, cotton, and wheat ; and it is to 
be hoped, if any have debts to meet now or hereafter, that they may meet 
them with the least inconvenience consistent with plain, downright integrity ; 
but, from being led astray by the loud declamations of those who earn nothing 
themselves and know no trade but spoliation of the earnings of others, let them 
heartily say, " Good Lord, deliver us." * * + 

A stupid charge, heretofore, in the front of debate, has been made, and 
wickedly repeated in many places, that the Coinage Act of 1873 was secretly 
and clandestinely engineered through Congress without proper consideration 
or knowledge of its contents ; but it is to be noted that this charge had its 
birth and growth years after the passage of the act, and not until after the fall 
of silver. Long ago it was declared by one of the old Greek dramatists that, 
" No lie ever grows old." This one is as fresh and boneless now as at its birth, 
and IS, therefore, swallowed with avidity by those to whom such food is nutri- 
tious or by those who have no appetite for searching the documents and 
records for facts. Whether the act itself was right or wrong does not depend 
upon the degradation of Congress implied in the original charge. Interested 
outsiders may glory in libeling Congress, but why should its own members? 
The act may be good and Congress bad, and yet it is to be hoped that the 
latter has not fallen to the level of its traducers. But there has been no fall 
of Congress ; only a fall of silver. To present the abundant evidence showing 
that few laws were ever more openly proposed, year after year, and squarely 
understood than the Coinage Act of 1873, will require but a moment. It had 
been for years elaborately considered and reported upon by the Deputy Comp- 
troller of the Currency. The special attention of Congress was called to the 
bill and the report by the Secretary of the Treasury in his annual reports for 



4 



THE REMONETIZATIQN OF SILVER. 269 

1870, 1871, and 1872, where the " new features " of the bill, " discontinuing the 
coinage of the silver dollar," were fully set forth. The extensive corre- 
spondence of the Department had been printed in relation to the proposed bill, 
and widely circulated. The bill was separately printed eleven times, and twice 
in reports of the Deputy Comptroller of the Currency, — thirteen times in all, — 
and so printed by order of Congress. A copy of the printed bill was many 
times on the table of every Senator, and I now have all of them here before 
me in large type. It was considered at much length by the appropriate com- 
mittees of both Houses of Congress ; and the debates at different times upon 
the bill in the Senate filled sixty-six columns of the Globe, and in the House 
seventy-eight columns of the Globe. No argus-eyed debater objected by any 
amendment to the discontinuance of the silver dollar. In substance the bill 
twice passed each House, and was finally agreed upon and reported by a very 
able and trustworthy committee of conference, where Mr. Sherman, Mr. Scott, 
and Mr. Bayard appeared on the part of the Senate. * * * 

The gold standard, it may confidently be asserted, is practically far cheaper 
than that of silver. I do not insist upon having the gold standard, but if we 
are to have but one, I think that the best. The expense of maintaining a 
metallic currency is of course greater than that of paper; but it must be borne 
in mind that a paper currency is only tolerable when convertible at the will of 
the holder into coin — and no one asks for more than that. A metallic cur- 
rency is also subject to considerable loss by abrasion or the annual wear ; and 
it is quite important to know which metal — gold or silver — can be most 
cheaply supported. A careful examination of the subject conclusively shows 
that the loss is nearly in proportion to the length of time coins have been in 
circulation, and to the amount of surface exposed, although small coins, being 
handled with less care, suffer most. The well-ascertained result is that it costs 
from fifteen to twenty-five times more to keep silver afloat than it does to main- 
tain the same amount in gold. To sustain the silver standard would annually 
cost about one per cent, for abrasion ; but that of gold would not exceed one- 
twentieth of one per cent. This is a troublesome charge, forever to bristle up 
in the pathway of a silver standard. It must also be borne in mind that the 
mint cost of coining silver is many times greater than that of the same amount 
in gold. More than sixteen tons of silver are required as the equivalent of 
one ton of gold. As a cold matter of fact, silver is neither the best nor the 
cheapest standard. It is far dearer to plant and forever dearer to maintain. 

A double standard put forth by us on the terms now proposed by the 
commission or by the House bill would be so only in name. The perfect dual 
ideal of theorists, based upon an exact equilibrium of values, cannot be realized 



270 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

while the intrinsic value of either of the component parts is overrated or 
remains a debatable question and everywhere more or less open to suspicion. 
A standard of value linked to the changing fortunes of two metals instead of 
one, when combined with an existing disjointed and all-pervading confusion 
in the ratio of value, must necessarily be linked to the hazard of double per- 
turbations and become an alternating standard in perpetual motion. 

The bimetallic scheme, with silver predominant — largely everywhere else 
suspended, if not repudiated — is pressed upon us now with a ratio that will 
leave nothing in circulation but silver, as a profitable mode of providing a 
new and cheaper way of pinching and paying the national debt ; but a mode 
which would leave even a possible cloud tipon our national credit should find 
neither favor nor tolerance among a proud and independent people. 

The proposition is openly and squarely made to pay the public debt at 
our option in whichever metal, gold or silver, happens to be cheapest, and 
chiefly for the reason that silver already happens to be at ten per cent, the 
cheapest. In 1873, to have paid the debt in silver would have cost three per 
cent, more than to have paid it in gold, and then there was no unwillingness 
on the part of the present non-contents to pay in gold. Silver was worth more 
then to sell than to pay on debts. No one then pulled out the hair of his 
head to cure grief for the disappearance of the nominal silver option. Since 
that time it has been and would be now cheaper nominally to pay in silver 
if we had it; and, therefore, we are urged to repudiate our former action and 
to claim the power to resume an option already once supposed to have been 
profitably exercised, of which the world was called upon to take notice, and 
to pay in silver to-day or to let it alone to-morrow. I know that the detestable 
doctrine of Machiavelli was that '' a prudent prince ought not to keep his word 
except when he can do it without injury to himself ; " but the Bible teaches a 
dififerent doctrine, and honoreth him " who sweareth to his own hurt and 
changeth not." If we would not multiply examples of individual financial tur- 
pitude, already painfully numerous, we must not trample out conscience and 
sound morality from the monetary affairs of the nation. The " option " about 
which we should be most solicitous was definitely expressed by Washington 
when he said : " There is an option left to the United States whether they 
will be respectable and prosperous or contemptible and miserable as a nation." 
Our national self-respect would not be increased when Turkey, as a delit-paying 
nation, shall be held as our equal and Mexico as our superior. The credit of 
a great nation cannot even be discussed without some loss; it cannot even be 
tempted by the devious advantages of legal technicahties without bringing 
some sense of shame; but to live, it must go. like chastity, unchallenged and 
unsuspected. * * * 



THE REMONETIZATION OF SILVER. 271 

The argument relied upon in favor of a bimetallic standard as against a 
monometallic seems to be that a single-metal standard leaves out one-half of 
the world's resources ; but the same thing must occur with a bimetallic stand- 
ard unless the metals can be placed and kept in a state of exact equilibrium, 
or so that nothing can be gained by the exchange of one for the other. Hith- 
erto this has been an unattainable perfection. A law fixing the ratio of sixteen 
or fifteen and one-half of silver to one of gold, as proposed by different mem- 
bers of the Commission, would now be a gross over-valuation of silver and 
wholly exclude gold from circulation. It will hardly be disputed that the two 
metals cannot circulate together unless they are muttially convertible without 
profit or loss at the ratio fixed at the mint. But it is here proposed to start 
silver with a large legal-tender advantage above its market value, and with the 
probability, through further depreciation, of increasing that advantage by which 
the monometallic standard of silver will be ordained and confirmed. The 
argument in behalf of a double standard is double-tongued, when in fact nothing 
is intended, or can be the outcome, but a simple silver standard. The argu- 
ment would wed silver and gold, but the conditions which follow amount to 
a decree of perpetual divorcement. Enforce the measure by legislation, and 
gold would at once flee out of the country. Like liberty, gold never stays 
where it is undervalued. 

No approach to a bimetallic currency of uniform and fixed value can be 
possible, as it appears to me, without the co-operation of the leading com- 
mercial nations. Even with that co-operation its accomplishment and perma- 
nence may not be absolutely certain, unless the late transcendent fickleness of 
the supply and demand subsides, or unless the ratio of value can be adjusted 
with more consummate accuracy than has hitherto been found by any single 
nation to be practicable. * * * 

I have failed of my purpose if I have not shown that there has been so 
large an increase of the stock of silver as of itself to efifect a positive reduction 
of its value ; and that this result has been confirmed and made irreversible by 
the new and extensive European disuse of silver coinage. I have indicated 
the advisability of obtaining the co-operation of other leading nations, in 
fixing upon a common ratio of value between gold and silver, before embark- 
ing upon a course of independent action from 'which there could be no retreat. 
I have also attempted to show that, even in the lowest pecuniary sense of 
profit, the Government of the United States could not be the gainer by pro- 
posing to pay either the public debt or the United States notes in silver; that 
such a payment would violate public pledges as to the whole, and violates 
existing statutes as to all that part of the debt contracted since 1870, and for 



2^2 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



which gold has been received ; that the remonetization of silver means the 
banishment of gold and our degradation among nations to the second or third 
rank ; that it would be a sweeping ten per cent, reduction of all duties upon 
imports, requiring the imposition of new taxes to that extent; that it would 
prevent the further funding of the public debt at a lower rate of interest and 
give to the present holders of our six per cent, bonds a great advantage ; 
that, instead of aiding resumption, it would only inflate a currency already too 
long depreciated, and consign it to a still lower deep ; that, instead of being a 
tonic to spur idle capital once more into activity, it would be its bane, de- 
structive of all vitality; and that as a permanent silver standard it would not 
only be void of all stability, and the dearest in its introduction and main- 
tenance, but that it would reduce the wages of labor to the full extent of the 
difference there might be between its purchasing power and that of gold. 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, January 28, 1878.) 





THE CHINESE QUESTION. 273 



The Chinese Question. 

By JAMES Q. BLAINE, of Maine. 

(Born 1830, died 1893.) 



TILL the wonder grows with me that if the aggregate immigration is 
so small and will remain so small, as my colleague states, he should 
still have thought and have voted that they ought not to be citizens, 
and could not be safely trusted with the elective franchise. All that 
my honorable colleague has said makes me wonder still more at that 
vote, although, as I state, I would have given the same vote with him, 
but I would have given it on entirely dififerent considerations and with an 
entirely different view. I am sure, even if I repeat myself in so saying, that 
no gentleman can justify all the responsibilities of making the immigrants citi- 
zens of the United States, because we cannot continue to expose the Pacific 
coast to that immigration with a non-voting class largely outnumbering the 
voting class. 

The Senator from Ohio (Mr. Matthews) made light of the race trouble. 
I supposed if there be any part of the world where a man would not make 
light of a race trouble it was the United States. I supposed if there were any 
people in the world that had a race trouble on hand it was the American people. 
I supposed if the admonitions of our own history were anything to us, we 
should regard the race trouble as the one thing to be dreaded, the one thing 
to be avoided. We are not through with it yet. It has cost us a great many 
lives ; it has cost us a great many millions of treasure. Does any man feel 
that we are safely through with it now? Does any man here to-day assume 
that we have so entirely solved and settled all the troubles growing out of 
the negro race trouble that we are prepared to invite a similar one? If so, 
he learns a lesson from history which I have not been taught. If any gentle- 
man, looking into the future of this country, sees, for certain sections of it 
at least, peace and good order and absolute freedom from any trouble grow- 
ing out of race, he sees with more sanguine vision than mine. With this 
trouble already upon us, it would, in my judgment, be the last degree of reck- 
lessness deliberately to invite or permit another and possibly a far more serious 
one to be thrust upon us. 



274 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Treat them like Christians, my colleague says ; and yet I believe the Chris- 
tian testimony from the Pacific coast is that the conversion of Chinese is largely 
a failure; that the demoralization of the white race is a much more rapid result 
of the contact than the conversion of the Chinese race, and that up to this 
time there has been little progress made in the one direction while much evil 
has been done in the other. I heard the honorable Senator from California, 
who sits on this side of the Chamber (Mr. Booth), say that there is not, as 
we understand it, in all the one hundred and twenty thousand Chinese (whether 
1 state the exact number does not matter in this point of view), there does 
not exist among the whole of them the relation of family. There is not a 
peasant's cottage inhabited by a Chinaman ; there is not a hearthstone, as it 
is found and cherished in an American home, or an English home, or a Ger- 
man home, or a French home. There is not a domestic fireside in that sense ; 
and yet you say th^t it is entirely safe to sit down and quietly permit that 
mode of life to be fastened upon our country. A half-century ago this ques- 
tion could not have been made a practical one. Means of communication, 
ease of access, cheapness of transportation, have changed the issue, and forced 
it upon our attention. I believe now that if the Congress of the United States 
should in effect confirm the treaty and the status of immigration as it now is, 
law and order could not be maintained in California without the interposition 
of the military five years hence. Do I overstate that ? 

Mr. Sargent. — I am sorry to say that I think the Senator does not over- 
state it. 

Mr. Blaine. — I do not justify the brutality of the treatment of those Chi- 
nese who are here. That is greatly to be regretted and greatly to be con- 
demned. But you must deal with things as you find them. If you foresee a 
conflict upon that coast by reason of an immigration that calls for the inter- 
position of the military, I think it is a great deal wiser and more direct way 
to avoid the trouble by preventing the immigration. 

I have heard much of late about their cheap labor. I do not myself believe 
in cheap labor. I do not believe cheap labor should be an object of legisla- 
tion, and it cannot be in a republic. The wealthy classes in a republic where 
suffrage is universal cannot safely legislate for cheap labor. I repeat it. The 
wealthy classes in a republic where suffrage is universal must not legislate in 
favor of cheap labor. Labor should not be cheap, and it should not be dear; 
it should have its share, and it will have its share. There is not a laborer on 
the Pacific coast to-day — I say that to my honorable colleague whose whole 
life has been consistent and uniform in defense and advocacy of the interests 
of the laboring classes — there is not a laboring man on the Pacific coast to-day 



THE CHINESE QUESTION. 



275 



who does not feel wounded and grieved by the competition that comes irom 
this immigration. Then the answer is, " But are not American laborers equal 
to Chinese laborers?" I answer that question by another. Were not free 
white American laborers equal to African slaves in the South? When you tell 
me that the Chinaman driving out the free American laborer only proves the 
superiority of the Chinaman, I ask you if the African slave driving out the 
free white labor from the South proved the superiority of slave labor? The 
conditions are not unlike : the parallel is not complete ; and yet it is a parallel. 
Chinese labor is servile labor. It is not free labor such as we intend to 
develop and encourage and build up in this country. It is labor that comes 
here under a mortgage. It is labor that comes here to subsist on what the 
American laborer cannot subsist on. You cannot work a man who must have 
beef and bread, and would like beer, in competition with a man who can live 
on rice. In all such conflicts and in all such struggles the result is not to 
bring up the man who lives on rice to the beef and bread standard. Slave 
labor degraded free labor. It took out its respectability ; it put an odious caste 
upon it. It throttled the prosperity of one of the fairest portions of the Union ; 
and a worse than slave labor will throttle and impair the prosperity of a still 
finer and fairer section of the Union. We can choose here to-day .whether 
our legislation shall be in the interest of the American free laborer or in favor 
of the servile laborer from China. 

(From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, February 14, 1879.) 




276 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




The Army Bill. 



By ROSCOE CONKLING, of New York. 

(Born 1829, died 1888.) 



I HE election law came in to correct abuses which reached their climax 
in 1868 in the city of New York. In that year, in the State of New York, 
the Republican candidate for Governor was elected; the Democratic 
candidate was counted in. Members of the Legislature were fraudu- 
lently seated. The election was a barbarous burlesque. Many thousand 
forged naturalization papers were issued ; some of them were white and 
some were cofifee-colored. The same witnesses purported to attest hundreds 
and thousands of naturalization affidavits, and the stupendous fraud of the whole 
thing was and is an open secret. Some of these naturalization papers were 
sent to other States. So plenty were they that some of them were sent to Ger- 
many, and Germans who had never left their country claimed exemption from 
the German draft for soldiers in the Franco-Prussian War, because they were 
naturalized American citizens. * * * 

I say thousands of men voted upon fraudulent naturalization papers. But 
all this was tame and paltry compared with other enormities. The city of New 
York was redistricted from time to time — sometimes so districted as to bisect 
blocks, and denizens of the same building could vote in different election pre- 
cincts. In some cases the Democratic majority was larger than the whole num- 
ber of men, women, children, horses, cats and dogs in the district, and I speak 
not in rhetorical figures, but in Arabic figures. 

Repeating, ballot-box stuffing, ruffianism and false counting decided every- 
thing. Tweed made the election officers, and the election officers were corrupt. 
In 1868 thirty thousand votes were falsely added to the Democratic majority 
in the cities of New York and Brooklyn alone. Taxes and elections were the 
mere spoil and booty of a corrupt junta in Tammany Hall. Assessments, exac- 
tions, and exemptions were made the bribes and the penalties of political submis- 
sion. Usurpation and fraud inaugurated a carnival of corrupt disorder; and 
obscene birds without number swooped down to the harvest and gorged them- 




ROSCOE CONKLING. 



278 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

selves on every side in plunder and spoliation. Wrongs and usurpations spring- 
ing from the pollution and desecration of the ballot-box stalked high-headed in 
the public way. The courts and the machinery of justice were impotent in the 
presence of culprits too great to be punished. 

The act of 1870 came in to throttle such abuses. It was not born without 
throes and pangs. It passed the Senate after a day and a night which rang 
with Democratic maledictions and foul aspersions. 

In the autumn of that year an election was held for the choice of Representa- 
tives in Congress. I see more than one friend near me who, for himself and 
for others, has reason even unto this day to remember that election and the 
apprehension which preceded it. It was the first time the law of 1870 had been 
put in force. Resistance was openly counseled. Democratic newspapers in 
New York advised that the officers of the law be pitched into the river. Dis- 
order was afoot. Men, not wanting in bravery, and not Republicans, dreaded 
the day. Bloodshed, arson, riot were feared. Ghastly spectacles were still 
fresh in memory. The draft riots had spread terror which had never died, and 
strong men shuddered when they remembered the bloody assizes of the Demo- 
cratic party. They had seen men and women, blind with party hate, dizzy 
and drunk with party madness, stab and burn and revel in murder and in muti- 
lating the dead. They had seen an asylum for colored orphans made a funeral 
pile, and its smoke sent up from their Christian and imperial city to tell in 
Heaven of the inhuman bigotry, the horrible barbarity of man. Remembering 
such sickening scenes, and dreading their repetition, they asked the President 
to protect them — to protect them with the beak and claw of national power. 
Instantly the unkenneled packs of party barked in vengeful chorus. Impreca- 
tions, maledictions, and threats were hurled at Grant; but with that splendid 
courage which never blanched in battle, which never quaked before clamor — 
with that matchless self-poise which did not desert him even when a continent 
beyond the sea rose and uncovered before him, he responded in the orders which 
it has pleased the Senator from Delaware to read. The election thus protected 
was the fairest, the freest, the most secure, a generation had seen. * * * 

Now, the election law is to be emasculated ; no national soldier must con- 
front rioters or mobs ; no armed man by national authority, though not a 
soldier, must stay the tide of brutality or force ; no deputy marshal must be 
within call ; no supervisor must have power to arrest any man who, in his 
sight, commits the most flagrant breach of the peace. But the Democrats tell 
us " we have not abolished the supervisors ; we have left them." Yes, the legis- 
lative bill leaves the supervisors, two stool-pigeons with their wings clipped, 



THE ARMY BILL. 279 

two licensed witnesses to stand about idle, and look — yes, " a cat may look at a 
king " — but they must not touch bullies or law-breakers, not if they do murders 
right before their eyes. 

If a civil oflficer should, under the pending amendment, attempt to quell a 
riot by calling on the bystanders, if they have arms, he is punishable for that. 
If a marshal, the marshal of the district in which the election occurs, the mar- 
shal nominated to the Senate and confirmed by the Senate — I do not mean 
a deputy marshal — should see an afifray or a riot, at the polls on election day, 
and call upon the bystanders to quell it, if this bill becomes a law, and one of 
those bystanders has a revolver in his pocket, or another one takes a stick or a 
cudgel in his hand, the marshal may be fined five thousand dollars and punished 
by five years' imprisonment. 

Such are the devices to belittle national authority and national law, to turn 
the idea of the sovereignty of the nation into a laughing-stock and a by-word. 

Under what pretexts is this uprooting and overturning to be? Any officer 
who transgresses the law, be he civil or military, may be punished in the courts 
of the State or in the courts of the nation under existing law. Is the election 
act unconstitutional? The courts for ten years have been open to that ques- 
tion. The law has been pounded with all the hammers of the lawyers, but it 
has stood the test; no court has pronounced it unconstitutional, although many 
men have been prosecuted and convicted under it. Judge Woodrufif and Judge 
Blatchford have vindicated its constitutionality. But, as I said before, the con- 
stitutional argument has been abandoned. The supreme political court, practi- 
cally now above Congresses or even Constitutions, the Democratic caucus, has 
decided that the law is constitutional. The record of the judgment is in the 
legislative bill. 

We are told it costs money to enforce the law. Yes, it costs money to 
enforce all laws ; it costs money to prosecute smugglers, counterfeiters, mail rob- 
bers, murderers, and others. We have been informed that it has cost two hun- 
dred thousand dollars to execute the election act. It cost more than five billions 
of dollars, in money alone, to preserve our institutions and our laws, in one 
war, and the nation which bled and the nation which paid is not likely to give 
up its institutions and the birthrights of its citizens for two hundred thousand 
dollars. * * * . 

(From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, April 24, 1879.) 




28o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Memorial Address. 

By JAMES G. BLAINE, of Maine. 

(Born 1830, died 1893.) 



R. PRESIDENT: For the second time in this generation the great 
departments of the Government of the United States are assembled 
in the Hall of Representatives to do honor to the memory of a mur- 
dered President. Lincoln fell at the close of a mighty struggle in 
which the passions of men had been deeply stirred. The tragical ter- 
mination of his great life added but another to the lengthened succes- 
sion of horrors which had marked so many lintels with the blood of the first-born. 
Garfield was slain in a day of peace, when brother had been reconciled to brother, 
and when anger and hate had been banished from the land. " Whoever shall 
hereafter draw the portrait of murder, if he will show it as it has been exhibited 
where such example was last to have been looked for, let him not give it the 
grim visage of Moloch, the brow knitted by revenge, the face black with set- 
tled hate. Let him draw, rather, a decorous, smooth-faced, bloodless demon; 
not so much an example of human natvire in its depravity and in its paroxysms 
of crime, as an infernal being, a fiend in the ordinary display and development 
of his character." 

From the landing of the Pilgrims at Plymouth till the uprising against 
Charles I., about twenty thousand emigrants came from old England to New 
England. As they came in pursuit of intellectual freedom and ecclesiastical 
independence rather than for worldly honor and profit, the emigration naturally 
ceased when the contest for religious liberty began in earnest at home. The 
man who struck his most effective blow for freedom of conscience by sailing 
for the colonies in 1620 would have been accounted a deserter to leave after 
1640. The opportunity had then come on the soil of England for that great 
contest which established the authority of Parliament, gave religious freedom 
to the people, sent Charles to the block, and committed to the hands of Oliver 
Cromwell the supreme executive authority of England. The English emigra- 
tion was never renewed, and from these twenty thousand men, and from a 
small emigration from Scotland, from Ireland, and from France, are descended 
the vast numbers who have New England blood in their veins. 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 281 

In 1685 the revocation of the edict of Nantes by Louis XIV. scattered to 
other countries four hundred thousand Protestants, who were among the most 
intelHgent and enterprising of French subjects — merchants of capital, skilled 
manufacturers, and handicraftsmen, superior at the time to all others in Europe. 
A considerable number of these Huguenot French came to America; a few 
landed in New England and became honorably prominent in its history. Their 
names have in large part become anglicized, or have disappeared, but their 
blood is traceable in many of the most reputable families, and their fame is 
perpetuated in honorable memorials and useful institutions. 

From these two sources, the English-Puritan and the French-Huguenot, 
came the late President — his father, Abram Garfield, being descended from 
the one, and his mother, Eliza Ballou, from the other. * * * 

His father dying before he was two years old, Garfield's early life was 
one of privation, but its poverty has been made indelicately and unjustly promi- 
nent. Thousands of readers have imagined him as the ragged, starving child, 
whose reality too often greets the eye in the squalid sections of our large cities. 
General Garfield's infancy and youth had none of this destitution, none of these 
pitiful features appealing to the tender heart, and to the open hand, of charity. 
He was a poor boy in the same sense in which Henry Clay was a poor boy; 
in which Andrew Jackson was a poor boy; in which Daniel Webster was a 
poor boy; in the sense in which a large majority of the eminent men of America 
in all generations have been poor boys. Before a great multitude, in a public 
speech, Mr. Webster bore this testimony : 

" It did not happen to me to be born in a log cabin, but my elder brothers 
and sisters were born in a log cabin raised amid the snow-drifts of New Hamp- 
shire, at a period so early that when the smoke rose first from its rude chimney 
and curled over the frozen hills there was no similar evidence of a white man's 
habitation between it and the settlements on the rivers of Canada. Its remains 
still exist. I make to it an annual visit. I carry my children to it to teach 
them the hardships endured by the generations which have gone before them. 
I love to dwell on the tender recollections, the kindred ties, the early affections, 
and the touching narratives and incidents which mingle with all I know of this 
primitive family abode." 

With the requisite change of scene the same words would aptly portray 
the early days of Garfield. The poverty of the frontier, where all are engaged 
in a common struggle and where a common sympathy and hearty co-operation 
lighten the burdens of each, is a very different poverty, different in kind, differ- 
ent in influence and effect, from that conscious and humiliating indigence which 
is every day forced to contrast itself with neighboring wealth on which it feels 



282 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

a sense of grinding dependence. The poverty of the frontier is indeed no pov- 
erty. It is but the beginning of wealth, and has the boundless possibilities of 
the future always opening before it. * * * 

No manly man feels anything of shame in looking back to early struggles 
with adverse circumstances, and no man feels a worthier pride than when he 
has conquered the obstacles to his progress. But no one of noble mold 
desires to be looked upon as having occupied a menial position, as having been 
repressed by a feeling of inferiority, or as having sufifered the evils of poverty 
until relief was found at the hand of charity. General Garfield's youth pre- 
sented no hardships which family love and family energy did not overcome, 
subjected him to no privations which he did not cheerfully accept, and left no 
memories save those which were recalled with delight, and transmitted with 
profit and with pride. 

Garfield's early opportunities for securing an education were extremely 
limited, and yet were sufficient to develop in him an intense desire to learn. 
He could read at three years of age, and each winter he had the advantage of 
the district school. He read all the books to be found within the circle of his 
acquaintance ; some of them he got by heart. While yet in childhood he was 
a constant student of the Bible, and became familiar with its literature. The 
dignity and earnestness of his speech in his maturer life gave evidence of this 
early training. At eighteen years of age he was able to teach school, and 
thenceforward his ambition was to obtain a college education. To this end 
he bent all his efforts, working in the harvest field, at the carpenter's bench, 
and, in the winter season, teaching the common schools of the neighborhood. 
While thus laboriously occupied he found time to prosecute his studies, and 
was so successfvil that at twenty-two years of age he was able to enter the 
junior class at Williams College, then under the presidency of the venerable 
and honored Mark Hopkins, who, in the fullness of his powers, survives the 
eminent pupil to whom he was of inestimable service. * * * 

Garfield's army life was begun with no other military knowledge than such 
as he had hastily gained from books in the few months preceding his march 
to the field. Stepping from civil life to the head of a regiment, the first order 
he received when ready to cross the Ohio was to assume command of a brigade, 
and to operate as an independent force in Eastern Kentucky. * * * 

The result of the campaign is matter of history. The skill, the endurance, 
the extraordinary energy shown by Garfield, the courage he imparted to his men, 
raw and untried as himself, the measures he adopted to increase his force and 
to create in the enemy's mind exaggerated estimates of his numbers, bore per- 
fect fruit in the routing of Marshall, the capture of his camp, the dispersion of 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 283 

his force, and the emancipation of an important territory from the control of the 
rebellion. Coming at the close of a long series of disasters to the Union arms, 
Garfield's victory had an unusual and extraneous importance, and in the popular 
judgment elevated the young commander to the rank of a military hero. With 
less than two thousand men in his entire command, with a mobilized force of 
only eleven hundred, without cannon, he had met an army of five thousand and 
defeated them — driving Marshall's forces successively from two strongholds 
of their own selection, fortified with abundant artillery. * * * 

The subsequent military career of Garfield fully sustained its brilliant be- 
ginning. With his new commission he was assigned to the command of a 
brigade in the Army of the Ohio, and took part in the second and decisive day's 
fight on the bloody field of Shiloh. The remainder of the year 1862 was not 
especially eventful to Garfield, as it was not to the armies with which he was 
serving. * * * 

Early in 1863 Garfield was assigned to the highly important and responsible 
post of chief of staff to General Rosecrans, then at the head of the Army of the 
Cumberland. Perhaps in a great military campaign no subordinate officer re- 
quires sounder judgment and quicker knowledge of men than the chief of staff 
to the commanding general. An indiscreet man in such a position can sow 
more discord, breed more jealousy, and disseminate more strife than any other 
officer in the entire organization. W^hen General Garfield assumed his new 
duties he found various troubles already well developed and seriously affecting 
the value and efficiency of the Army of the Cumberland. The energy, the im- 
partiality, and the tact with which he sought to allay these dissensions, and to 
discharge the duties of his new and trying position, will always remain one of 
the most striking proofs of his great versatility. His military duties closed on 
the memorable field of Chickamauga, a field which, however disastrous to the 
Union arms, gave to him the occasion of winning imperishable laurels. The 
very rare distinction was accorded him of a great promotion for bravery on a 
field that was lost. President Lincoln appointed him a major-general in the 
Army of the United States for gallant and meritorious conduct in the battle of 
Chickamauga. 

The Army of the Cumberland was reorganized under the command of 
General Thomas, who promptly offered Garfield one of its divisions. He was 
extremely desirous to accept the position, but was embarrassed by the fact that 
he had, a year before, been elected to Congress, and the time when he must 
take his seat was drawing near. * * * 

He resigned his commission of major-general on the 5th day of December, 
1863, ^^^ took his seat in the House of Representatives on the 7th. He had 



284 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

served two years and four months in the Army, and had just completed his 
thirty-second year. 

The Thirty-eighth Congress is pre-eminently entitled in history to the 
designation of the War Congress. It was elected while the war was flagrant, 
and every member was chosen upon the issues involved in the continuance of 
the struggle. The Thirty-seventh Congress had, indeed, legislated to a large 
extent on war measures, but it was chosen before anyone believed that secession 
of the States would be actually attempted. The magnitude of the work which 
fell upon its successor was unprecedented, both in respect to the vast sums of 
money raised for the support of the Army and Navy, and of the new and 
extraordinary powers of legislation which it was forced to exercise. Only 
twenty-four States were represented, and one hundred and eighty-two members 
were upon its roll. Among these were many distinguished party leaders on 
both sides, veterans in the public service, with established reputations for ability, 
and with that skill which comes only from parliamentary experience. Into this 
assemblage of men Garfield entered without special preparation, and, it might 
almost be said unexpectedly. The question of taking command of a division 
of troops under General Thomas, or taking his seat in Congress, was kept open 
till the last moment, so late, indeed, that the resignation of his military commis- 
sion and his appearance in the House were almost contemporaneous. He wore 
the uniform of a major-general of the United States Army on Saturday, and on 
Monday, in civilian's dress, he answered to the roll-call as a Representative in 
Congress from the State of Ohio. 

He was especially fortunate in the constituency which elected him. De- 
scended almost entirely from New England stock, the men of the Ashtabula 
district were intensely radical on all questions relating to human rights. Well 
educated, thrifty, thoroughly intelligent in affairs, acutely discerning of char- 
acter, not quick to bestow confidence, and slow to withdraw it, they were at 
once the most helpful and most exacting of supporters. Their tenacious trust 
in men in whom they have once confided is illustrated by the unparalleled fact 
that Elisha Whittlesey, Joshua R. Giddings, and James A. Garfield represented 
the district for fifty-four years. * * * 

With possibly a single exception, Garfield was the youngest member in 
the House when he entered, and was but seven years from his college gradua- 
tion. But he had not been in his seat sixty days before his ability was recognized 
and his place conceded. He stepped to the front with the confidence of one who 
belonged there. The House was crowded with strong men of both parties ; nine- 
teen of them have since been transferred to the Senate, and many of them have 
served with distinction in the gubernatorial chairs of their respective States, and 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 285 

on foreign missions of great consequence ; but among them all none grew so 
rapidly, none so firmly, as Garfield. * * * 

As a parliamentary orator, as a debater on an issue squarely joined, where 
the position had been chosen and the ground laid out, Garfield must be assigned 
a very high rank. More, perhaps, than any man with whom he was associated 
in public life, he gave careful and systematic study to public questions, and he 
came to every discussion in which he took part with elaborate and complete 
preparation. He was a steady and indefatigable worker. Those who imagine 
that talent or genius can supply the place or achieve the results of labor will 
find no encouragement in Garfield's life. In preliminary work he was apt, rapid, 
and skillful. He possessed in a high degree the power of readily absorbing 
ideas and facts, and, like Dr. Johnson, had the art of getting from a book all 
that was of value in it by a reading apparently so quick and cursory that it 
seemed like a mere glance at the table of contents. He was a pre-eminently fair 
and candid man in debate, took no petty advantage, stooped to no unworthy 
methods, avoided personal allusions, rarely appealed to prejudice, did not seek 
to inflame passion. He had a quicker eye for the strong point of his adversary 
than for his weak point, and on his own side he so marshaled his weighty argu- 
ments as to make his hearers forget any possible lack in the complete strength 
of his position. He had a habit of stating his opponent's side with such ampli- 
tude of fairness and such liberality of concession that his followers often com- 
plained that he was giving his case away. But never in his prolonged 
participation in the proceedings of the House did he give his case away, or fail 
in the judgment of competent and impartial listeners to gain the mastery. 

These characteristics, which marked Garfield as a great debater, did not, 
however, make him a great parliamentary leader. A parliamentary leader, as 
that term is understood wherever free representative government exists, is neces- 
sarily and very strictly the organ of his party. * * * 

For an achievement of that kind Garfield was disqualified — disqualified by 
the texture of his mind, by the honesty of his heart, by his conscience, and by 
every instinct and aspiration of his nature. 

The three most distinguished parliamentary leaders hitherto developed in 
this country are Mr. Clay, Mr. Douglas, and Mr. Thaddeus Stevens. They were 
all men of consummate ability, of great earnestness, of intense personality, differ- 
ing widely each from the others, and yet with a signal trait in common — the 
power to command. In the give-and-take of daily discussion, in the art of con- 
trolling and consolidating reluctant and refractory followers, in the skill to over- 
come all forms of opposition, and to meet with competency and courage the 
varying phases of unlooked-for assault or unsuspected defection, it would be 



286 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

difficult to rank with these a fourth name in all our congressional history. But 
oJ these Mr. Clay was the greatest. It would, perhaps, be impossible to find in 
the parliamentary annals of the world a parallel to Mr. Clay. In 1841, at sixty- 
four years of age he took the control of the Whig party from the President who 
liad received their suffrages, against the power of Webster in the Cabmet, 
against the eloquence of Choate in the Senate, against the herculean efforts of 
Caleb Cushing and Henry A. Wise in the House. In unshared leadership, in 
the pride and plenitude of power, he hurled against John Tyler with deepest 
scorn the mass of that conquering column which had swept over the land in 
"1840, and drove his administration to seek shelter behind the lines of its political 
foes. * * * 

From these three great men Garfield differed radically, differed in the quality 
of his mind, in temperament, in the form and phase of ambition. He could not 
do what they did, but he could do what they could not, and in the breadth of 
his congressional work he left that which will longer exert a potential influence 
among men, and which, measured by the severe test of posthumous criticism, 
will secure a more enduring and more enviable fame. * * :»= 

Garfield's nomination to the Presidency, while not predicted or anticipated, 
was not a surprise to the country. His prominence in Congress, his solid quali- 
ties, his wide reputation, strengthened by his then recent election as Senator 
from Ohio, kept him in the public eye as a man occupying the \ery highest 
rank among those entitled to be called statesmen. It was not mere chance that 
brought him this high honor. " We must," says Mr. Emerson, " reckon success 
a constitutional trait. If Eric is in robust health and has slept well and is at the 
top of his condition, and thirty years old at his departure from Greenland, he 
will steer west and his ships will reach Newfoundland. But take Eric out and 
]mt in a stronger and bolder man, and the ships will sail six hundred, one thou- 
sand, fifteen hundred miles farther and reach Labrador and New England. 
There is no chance in results." 

As a candidate, Garfield steadily grew in popular favor. He was met with 
a storm of detraction at the very hour of his nomination, and it continued with 
increasing volume and momentum until the close of his victorious campaign. 

Under it all he was calm, and strong, and confident; never lost his self- 
possession, did no unwise act, spoke no hasty or ill-considered word. Indeed, 
nothing in his whole life is more remarkable or more creditable than his bear- 
ing through those five full months of vituperation — a prolonged agony of trial 
to a sensitive man, a constant and cruel draft upon the powers of moral endur- 
ance. The great mass of these unjust imputations passed unnoticed, and with 
the general debris of the campaign fell into oblivion. But in a few instances the 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 287 

iron entered his soul, and he died with the injury unforgotten if not 
unforgiven. 

One aspect of Garfield's candidacy was unprecedented. Never before, in 
the history of partisan contests in this country, had a successful presidential 
candidate spoken freely on passing events and current issues. To attempt any- 
thing of the kind seemed novel, rash, and even desperate. The older class of 
voters recalled the unfortunate Alabama letter, in which Mr. Clay was supposed 
to have signed his political death-warrant. They remembered also the hot- 
tempered effusion by which General Scott lost a large share of his popularity 
before his nomination, and the unfortunate speeches which rapidly consumed 
the remainder. The younger voters had seen Mr. Greeley, in a series of vigorous 
and original addresses, preparing the pathway for his own defeat. Unmindful 
of these warnings, unheeding the advice of friends, Garfield spoke to large 
crowds as he journeyed to and from New York in August, to a great multitude 
in that city, to delegations and deputations of every kind that called at Mentor 
during the summer and autumn. With innumerable critics, watchful and eager 
to catch a phrase that might be turned into odium or ridicule, or a sentence that 
might be distorted to his own or his party's injury, Garfield did not trip or 
halt in any one of his seventy speeches. This seems all the more remarkable 
when it is remembered that he did not write what he said, and yet spoke with 
such logical consecutiveness of thought and such admirable precision of phrase 
as to defy the accident of misreport and the malignity of misrepresentation. 

In the beginning of his presidential life Garfield's experience did not yield 
him pleasure or satisfaction. The duties that engross so large a portion of the 
President's time were distasteful to him, and were unfavorably contrasted with his 
legislative work. " I have been dealing all these years with ideas," he impa- 
tiently exclaimed one day, " and here I am dealing only with persons. I have 
been heretofore treating of the fundamental principles of government, and here 
I am considering all day whether A. or B. shall be appointed to this or that 
office. " He was earnestly seeking some practical way of correcting the evils 
arising from the distribution of overgrown and unwieldy patronage — evils al- 
ways appreciated and often discussed by him, but whose magnitude had been 
more deeply impressed upon his mind since his accession to the Presidency. 
Had he lived, a comprehensive improvement in the mode of appointment and 
in the tenure of office would have been proposed by him, and, with the aid of 
Congress, no doubt perfected. 

But, while many of the Executive duties were not grateful to him, he was 
assiduous and conscientious in their discharge. From the very outset he ex- 
hibited administrative talent of a high order. He grasped the helm of office 
with the hand of a master. * * * 



288 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Garfield's ambition for the success of his administration was high. With 
strong caution and conservatism in his nature, he was in no danger of attempt- 
ing rash experiments or of resorting to the empiricism of statesmanship. But 
he believed that renewed and closer attention should be given to questions 
affecting the material interests and commercial prospects of fifty millions of 
people. He believed that our continental relations, extensive and undeveloped 
as they are, involved responsibility, and could be cultivated into profitable friend- 
ship or be abandoned to harmful indifference or lasting enmity. He believed 
with equal confidence that an essential forerunner to a new era of national 
progress must be a feeling of contentment in every section of the Union, and a 
generous belief that the benefits and burdens of government would be common 
to all. Himself a conspicuous illustration of what ability and ambition may do 
under republican institutions, he loved his country with a passion of patriotic 
devotion, and every waking thought was given to her advancement. He was 
an American in all his aspirations, and he looked to the destiny and influence 
of the United States with the philosophic composure of Jefferson and the 
demonstrative confidence of John Adams. 

The political events which disturbed the President's serenity for many 
weeks before that fateful day in July form an important chapter in his career, 
and, in his own judgment, involved questions of principle and of right which 
are vitally essential to the constitutional administration of the Federal Govern- 
ment. It would be out of place here and now to speak the language of con- 
troversy ; but the events referred to, however they may continue to be source 
of contention with others, have become, so far as Garfield is concerned, as much 
a matter of history as his heroism at Chickamauga, or his illustrious service in 
the House. Detail is not needful, and personal antagonism shall not be re- 
kindled by any word uttered to-day. The motives of those opposing him are 
not to be here adversely interpreted nor their course harshly characterized. 
But of the dead President this is to be said, and said because his own speech is 
forever silenced and he can be no more heard except through the fidelity and 
love of surviving friends ; from the beginning to the end of the controversy he 
so much deplored, the President was never for one moment actuated by any 
motive of gain to himself or of loss to others. Least of all men did he harbor 
revenge, rarely did he even show resentment, and malice was not in his nature. 
He was congenially employed only in the exchange of good offices and the 
doing of kindly deeds. 

There was not an hour, from the beginning of the trouble till the fatal shot 
entered his body, when the President would not gladly, for the sake of restoring 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 289 

harmony, have retraced any step he had taken if such retracing had merely 
involved consequences personal to himself. * * * 

The religious element in Garfield's character was deep and earnest. In 
his early youth he espoused the faith of the Disciples, a sect of that great Bap- 
tist communion, which in different ecclesiastical establishments is so numerous 
and so influential throughout all parts of the United States. * * * 

The liberal tendency which he anticipated as the result of wider culture 
was fully realized. He was emancipated from mere sectarian belief, and with 
eager interest pushed his investigations in the direction of modern progressive 
thought. He followed with quickening step in the paths of exploration and 
speculation so fearlessly trodden by Darwin, by Huxley, by Tyndall, and by 
other living scientists of the radical and advanced type. His own church, bind- 
ing its disciples by no formulated creed, but accepting the Old and New Testa- 
ments as the word of God, with unbiased liberality of private interpretation, 
favored, if it did not stimulate, the spirit of investigation. * * * 

The crowning characteristic of General Garfield's religious opinions, as, 
indeed, of all his opinions, was his liberality. In all things he had charity. 
Tolerance was of his nature. He respected in others the qualities which he pos- 
sessed himself — sincerity of conviction and frankness of expression. With 
him the inquiry was not so much what a man believes, but does he believe it? 
The lines of his friendship and his confidence encircled men of every creed, and 
men of no creed, and to the end of his life, on his ever-lengthening list of friends, 
were to be found the names of a pious Catholic priest and of an honest-minded 
and generous-hearted free-thinker. 

On the morning of Saturday, July 2d, the President was a contented and 
happy man — not in an ordinary degree, but joyfully, almost boyishly happy. 
On his way to the railroad station, to which he drove slowly, in conscious en- 
joyment of the beautiful morning, with an unwonted sense of leisure and a keen 
anticipation of pleasure, his talk was all in the grateful and gratulatory vein. 
He felt that after four months of trial his administration was strong in its grasp 
of afifairs, strong in popular favor, and destined to grow stronger; that grave 
difKculties confronting him at his inauguration had been safely passed; that 
trouble lay behind him and not before him ; that he was soon to meet the wife 
whom he loved, now recovering from an illness which had but lately disquieted 
and at times almost unnerved him ; that he was going to his Alma Mater to 
renew the most cherished associations of his young manhood, and to exchange 
greetings with those whose deepening interest had followed every step of his 
upward progress from the day he entered upon his college course until he had 
attained the loftiest elevation in the gift of his countrymen. 



290 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Surely, if happiness can ever come from the honors or triumphs of this 
world, on that quiet July morning James A. Garfield may well have been a 
liappy man. No foreboding of evil haunted him ; no slightest premonition of 
danger clouded his sky. His terrible fate was upon him in an instant. One 
moment he stood erect, strong, confident in the years stretching peacefully out 
before him. The next he lay wounded, bleeding, helpless, doomed to weary 
Vi^eeks of torture, to silence, and the grave. 

Great in life, he was surpassingly great in death. For no cause, in the very 
frenzy of wantonness and wickedness, by the red hand of murder, he was thrust 
from the full tide of this world's interest, from its hopes, its aspirations, its 
victories, into the visible presence of death — and he did not quail. Not alone 
for the one short moment in which, stunned and dazed, he could give up life, 
hardly aware of its relinquishment, but through days of deadly languor, through 
weeks of agony, that was not less agony because silently borne, with clear sight 
and calm courage, he looked into his open grave. What blight and ruin met 
his anguished eyes, whose lips may tell — what brilliant, broken plans, what 
baffled, high ambitions, what sundering of strong, warm, manhood's friend- 
ships, what bitter rending of sweet household ties ! Behind him a proud, ex- 
pectant nation, a great host of sustaining friends, a cherished and happy mother, 
wearing the full, rich honors of her early toil and tears ; the wife of his youth, 
whose whole life lay in his ; the little boys not yet emerged from childhood's day 
of frolic; the fair young daughter; the sturdy sons just springing into closest 
companionship, claiming every day and every day rewarding a father's love and 
care ; and in his heart the eager, rejoicing power to meet all demand. Before 
him, desolation and great darkness ! And his soul was not shaken. His 
countrymen were thrilled with instant, profound, and universal sympathy. 
Masterful in his mortal weakness, he became the center of a nation's love, en- 
shrined in the prayers of a world. But all the love and all the sympathy could 
not share with him his suffering. He trod the winepress alone. With un- 
faltering front he faced death. With unfailing tenderness he took leave of life. 
Above the demoniac hiss of the assassin's bullet he heard the voice of God. 
With simple resignation he bowed to the divine decree. 

As the end drew near, his early craving for the sea returned. The stately 
mansion of power had been to him the wearisome hospital of pain, and he 
begged to be taken from its prison walls, from its oppressive, stifling air, from 
its homelessness and its helplessness. Gently, silently, the love of a great people 
bore the pale sufferer to the longed-for healing of the sea, to live or to die, as 
God should will, within sight of its heaving billows, within sound of its mani- 
fold voices. With wan, fevered face tenderly lifted to the cooling breeze, he 



MEMORIAL ADDRESS. 



291 



looked out wistfully upon the ocean's changing wonders ; on its far sails, whiten- 
ing in the morning light ; on its restless waves, rolling shoreward to break and 
die beneath the noonday sun ; on the red clouds of evening, arching low to the 
horizon ; on the serene and shining pathway of the stars. Let us think that 
his dying eyes read a mystic meaning which only the rapt and parting soul may 
know. Let us belicA'^e that in the silence of the receding world he heard the 
great waves breaking on a farther shore, and felt already upon his wasted brow 
tlie breath of the eternal morning. 

(Delivered in the Hall of Representatives, February 27, 1882.) 



«*'«t; ^^& 




292 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




The Spoils System. 



By GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS, of New York. 

(Born 1824, died 1892.) 



^HE spoils spirit struggled desperately to obtain possession of the national 
administration from the day of Jefferson's inauguration to that of Jack- 
son's, when it succeeded. Its first great but undesigned triumph was 
the decision of the First Congress in 1789, vesting the sole power of 
removal in the President, a decision which placed almost every position 
in the Civil Service unconditionally at his pleasure. This decision was 
determined by the weight of Madison's authority. But Webster, nearly fifty 
years afterward, opposing his authority to that of Madison, while admitting the 
decision to have been final, declared it to have been wrong. The year 1820, 
which saw the great victory of slavery in the Missouri compromise, was also 
the year in which the second great triumph of the spoils system was gained, 
by the passage of the law which, under the plea of securing greater responsibility 
in certain financial offices, limited such ofifices to a term of four years. The 
decision of 1789, which gave the sole power of removal to the President, required 
positive executive action to effect removal ; but this law of 1820 vacated all the 
chief financial offices, with all the places dependent upon them, during the term 
of every President, who, without an order of removal, could fill them all at his 
pleasure. 

A little later a change in the method of nominating the President from a 
congressional caucus to a national convention still further developed the power 
of patronage as a party resource, and in the session of 1825-1826, when John 
Quincy Adams was President, Mr. Benton introduced his report upon Mr. 
Macon's resolution declaring the necessity of reducing and regulating executive 
patronage ; although Mr. Adams, the last of the Revolutionary line of Presidents, 
so scorned to misuse patronage that he leaned backward in standing erect. The 
pressure for the overthrow of the constitutional system had grown steadily more 
angry and peremptory with the progress of the country, the development of 




George William Curtis. 



294 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

party spirit, the increase of patronage, the unanticipated consequences of the 
sole executive power of removal, and the immense opportunity offered by the 
four-years' lav^. It was a pressure against which Jefiferson held the gates by 
main force, which was relaxed by the war under Madison and the fusion of 
parties under Monroe, but which swelled again into a furious torrent as the 
later parties took form. John Quincy Adams adhered, with the tough tenacity 
of his father's son, to the best principles of all his predecessors. He followed 
Washington, and observed the spirit of the Constitution in refusing to remove 
for any reason but official misconduct or incapacity. But he knew well what 
was coming, and with characteristically stinging sarcasm he called General Jack- 
son's inaugural address " a threat of reform." With Jackson's administration in 
1830 the deluge of the spoils system burst over our national politics. Sixteen 
years later, Mr. Buchanan said in a public speech that General Taylor wotild be 
faithless to the Whig party if he did not proscribe Democrats. So high tlie 
deluge had risen which has ravaged and wasted oitr politics ever since, and the 
danger will be stayed only when every President, leaning upon the law, shall 
stand fast where John Quincy Adams stood. 

But the debate contintied driring the whole Jackson administration. In the 
Senate and on the stump, in elaborate reports and popular speeches, Webster, 
Calhoun, and Clay, the great political chiefs of their time, sought to alarm the 
country with the dangers of patronage. Sargent S. Prentiss, in the House of 
Representatives, caught tip and echoed the cry tmder the administration of Van 
Buren. But the country refused to be alarmed. * * * 

It heard the uproar like the old lady ttpon her first railroad journey, who 
sat serene amid the wreck of a collision, and when asked if she was much hurt, 
looked over her spectacles and answered, blandly, " Hurt? Why, I supposed 
they always stopped so in this kind of traveling." The feeling that the denuncia- 
tion was only a part of the game of politics, and no more to be accepted as a 
true statement than Snug the joiner as a true lion, was confirmed by the fact 
that when the Whig opposition came into power with President Harrison, it 
adopted the very policy which under Democratic administration it had strenu- 
ously denounced as fatal. The pressure for place was even greater than it had 
been ten years before, and although Mr. Webster as Secretary of State main- 
tained his consistency by ptttting his name to an executive order asserting sound 
principles, the order was swept away like a lamb by a locomotive. Nothing 
but a miracle, said General Harrison's Attorney-General, can feed the swarm of 
hungry office-seekers. 

Adopted by both parties, Mr. Marcy's doctrine that the places in the public 
service are the proper spoils of a victorious party, was accepted as a necessary 



THE SPOILS SYSTEM. 295 

condition of popular government. One of the highest ofificers of the Govern- 
ment expounded this doctrine to me long afterward. " I believe," said he, " that 
when the people vote to change a party administration they vote to change 
every person of the opposite party who holds a place, from the President of the 
United States to the messenger at my door." It is this extraordinary but sincere 
misconception of the function of party in a free government that leads to the 
serious defense of the spoils system. Now, a party is merely a voluntary associa- 
tion of citizents to secure the enforcement of a certain policy of administration 
upon which they are agreed. In a free government this is done by the election 
of legislators and of certain executive officers who are friendly to that policy. 
But the duty of the great body of persons employed in the minor administrative 
places is in no sense political. It is wholly ministerial, and the political opinions 
of such persons affect the discharge of their duties no more than their religious 
views or their literary preferences. All that can be justly required of such per- 
sons, in the interest of the public business, is honesty, intelligence, capacity, 
industry, and due subordination ; au'd to say that, when the policy of the Gov- 
ernment is changed by the result of an election from protection to free trade, 
every bookkeeper and letter carrier and messenger and porter in the public 
ofifices ought to be a free tradef, is as wise as to say that if a merchant is a 
Baptist every clerk in his office ought to be a believer in total immersion. But 
the officer of whom I spoke undoubtedly expressed the general feeling. The 
necessarily evil consequences of the practice which he justified seemed to be still 
speculative and inferential, and to the national indifference which followed the 
war the demand of Mr. Jenckes for reform appeared to be a mere whimsical 
vagary mos^t inopportunely introduced. 

It was, however, soon evident that the war had made the necessity of reform 
imperative, and chiefly for two reasons : first, the enormous increase of patron- 
age, and second, the fact that circumstances had largely identified a party name 
with patriotism. The great and radical evil of the spoils system was carefully 
fostered by the apparent absolute necessity to the public welfare of making politi- 
cal opinion and sympathy a condition of appointment to the smallest place. 
It is since the war, therefore, that the evil has run riot and that its consequences 
have been fully revealed. Those consequences are now familiar, and I shall not 
describe them. It is enough that the most patriotic and intelligent Americans 
and the most competent foreign observers agree that the direct and logical re- 
sults of that system are the dangerous confusion of the executive and legislative 
powers of the Government ; the conversion of politics into mere place hunting ; 
the extension of the mischief to State and county and city administration, and 
the consequent degradation of the national character; the practical disfranchise- 



296 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

merit of the people wherever the system is most powerful ; and the perversion of 
a republic of equal citizens into a despotism of venal politicians. * * * 

The whole system of appointments in the Civil Service proceeds from the 
President, and in regard to his action the intention of the Constitution is indis- 
putable. It is that the President shall appoint solely upon public considerations, 
and that the officer appointed shall serve as long as he discharges his duty faith- 
fully. This is shown in Mr. Jefferson's familiar phrase in his reply to the remon- 
strance of the merchants of New Haven against the removal of the collector of 
that port. Mr. Jefferson asserted that Mr. Adams had purposely appointed in 
the last moments of his administration officers whose designation he should have 
left to his successor. Alluding to these appointments, he says : " I shall correct 
the procedure, and that done, return with joy to that state of things when the 
only question concerning a candidate shall be, Is he honest? Is he capable? 
Is he faithful to the Constitution ? " Mr. Jefferson here recognizes that these 
had been the considerations which had usually determined appointments ; and 
Mr. Madison, in the debate upon the President's sole power of removal, declared 
that if a President should remove an officer for any reason not connected with 
efficient service, he would be impeached. Reform, therefore, is merely a return 
to the principle and purpose of the Constitution and to the practice of the early 
administrations. 

What more is necessary, then, for reform than that the President should 
return to that practice ? As all places in the Civil Service are filled either by his 
direct nomination or by officers whom he appoints, why has not any President 
ample constitutional authority to effect at any moment a complete and thorough 
reform? The answer is simple. He has the power. He has always had it. A 
President has only to do as Washington did, and all his successors have only to 
do likewise, and reform would be complete. Every President has but to refuse to 
remove non-political officers for political or personal reasons ; to appoint only 
those whom he knows to be competent ; to renominate, as Monroe and John 
Quincy Adams did, every faithful officer whose commission expires, and to re- 
quire the heads of departments and all inferior appointing officers to conform to 
this practice, and the work would be done. This is apparently a short and easy 
and constitutional method of reform, requiring no further legislation or scheme 
of procedure. But why has no President adopted it ? For the same reason that 
the best of Popes does not reform the abuses of his church. For the same reason 
that a leaf goes over Niagara. It is because the opposing forces are overpower- 
ing. The same high officer of the Government to whom I have alluded said to 
me as we drove upon the Heights of Washington, " Do you mean that I ought 



THE SPOILS SYSTEM. 297 

not to appoint my subordinates for whom I am responsible ? " I answered : 
'■ I mean that you do not appoint them now ; I mean that if, when we return to 
the Capital, you hear that your chief subordinate is dead, you will not appoint 
his successor. You will have to choose among the men urged upon you by 
certain powerful politicians. Undoubtedly you ought to appoint the man whom 
you believe to be the most fit. But you do not and cannot. If you could or 
did appoint such men only, and that were the rule of your department and of the 
service, there would be no need of reform." And he could not deny it. * * * 

A President who should alone undertake thoroughly to reform the evil must 
feel it to be the vital and paramount issue, and must be willing to hazard every- 
thing for its success. He must have the absolute faith and the indomitable will 
of Luther. " Here stand I ; I can no other." How can we expect a President 
whom this system elects to devote himself to its destruction? General Grant, 
elected by a spontaneous patriotic impulse, fresh from the regulated order of 
military life and new to politics and politicians, saw the reason and the necessity 
of reform. The hero of a victorious war, at the height of his popularity, his 
party in undisputed and seemingly indisputable supremacy, made the attempt. 
Congress, good-naturedly tolerating what it considered his whim of inexperience, 
granted money to try an experiment. The adverse pressure was tremendous. 
" I am used to pressure," said the soldier. So he was, but not to this pressure. 
He was driven by unknown and incalculable currents. He was enveloped in 
whirlwinds of sophistry, scorn, and incredulity. He who upon his own line had 
fought it out all summer to victory, upon a line absolutely new and unknown 
was naturally bewildered and dismayed. * * * 

When at last President Grant said,' " If Congress adjourns without positive 
legislation on Civil Service reform, I shall regard such action as a disapproval of 
the system and shall abandon it," it was, indeed, a surrender, but it was the 
surrender of a champion who had honestly mistaken both the nature and the 
strength of the adversary and his own power of endurance. 

It is not, then, reasonable, under the conditions of our Government and in 
the actual situation, to expect a President to go much faster or much further than 
public opinion. But executive action can aid most effectively the development 
and movement of that opinion, and the most decisive reform measures that the 
present administration might take would be undoubtedly supported by a power- 
ful public sentiment. The educative results of resolute executive action, how- 
ever limited and incomplete in scope, have been shown in the two great public 
ofifices of which I have spoken, the New York custom-house and the New York 
post-ofifice. * * * 

The root of the complex evil, then, is personal favoritism. This produces 



298 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

congressional dictation, senatorial usurpation, arbitrary removals, interference in 
elections, political assessments, and all the consequent corruption, degradation, 
and danger that experience has disclosed. The method of reform, therefore, 
must be a plan of selection for appointment which makes favoritism impossible. 
The general feeling undoubtedly is that this can be accomplished by a fixed 
limited term. But the terms of most of the offices to which the President and 
the Senate appoint, and upon which the myriad minor places in the service 
depend, have been fixed and limited for sixty years, yet it is during that very 
period that the chief evils of personal patronage have appeared. The law of 
1820, which limited the term of important revenue offices to four years, and 
which was afterward extended to other offices, was intended, as John Quincy 
Adams tells us, to promote the election to the presidency of Mr. Crawford, who 
was then Secretary of the Treasury. The law was drawn by Mr. Crawford him- 
self, and it was introduced into the Senate by one of his devoted partisans. It 
placed the whole body of executive financial officers at the mercy of the Secre- 
tary of the Treasury and of a majority of the Senate, and its design, as Mr. 
Adams says, " was to secure for Mr. Crawford the influence of all the incum- 
bents in office, at the peril of displacement, and of five or ten times an equal 
number of ravenous office-seekers, eager to supplant them." This is the very 
substance of the Spoils System, intentionally introduced by a fixed limitation of 
term in place of the constitutional tenure of efficient service ; and it was so far 
successful that it made the custom-house officers, district attorneys, marshals, 
registers of the land office, receivers of public money, and even paymasters in 
the army, notoriously active partisans of Mr. Crawford. =!< * * 

To fix by law the terms of places dependent upon such offices would be 
like an attempt to cure hydrophobia by the bite of a mad dog. The incumbent 
would be always busy keeping his influence in repair to secure reappointment, 
and the applicant would be equally busy in seeking such influence to procure the 
place, and as the fixed terms would be constantly expiring, <-he eager and angry 
intrigue and contest of influence would be as endless as it is now. This certainly 
would not be reform. 

But would not reform be secured by adding to a fixed limited term the 
safeguard of removal for cause only? Removal for cause alone means, of 
course., removal for legitimate cause, such as dishonesty, negligence, or in- 
capacity. But who shall decide that such cause exists ? This must be deter- 
mined either by the responsible superior officer or by some other authority. 
But if left to some other authority the right of counsel and the forms of a 
court would be invoked; the whole legal machinery of mandamuses, injunctions, 
certioraris, and the rules of evidence would be put in play to keep an incompe- 



THE SPOILS SYSTEM. 299 

tent clerk at his desk or a sleepy watchman on his beat. Cause for the removal 
of a letter carrier in the post-ofhce or of an accountant in the custom-house 
would be presented with all the pomp of impeachment and established like a 
high crime and misdemeanor. Thus every clerk in every office would have a 
kind of vested interest in his place because, however careless, slovenly, or trouble- 
some he might be, he could be displaced only by an elaborate and doubtful 
legal process. Moreover, if the head of a bureau, or a collector, or a postmaster 
were obliged to. prove negligence, or insolence, or incompetency against a clerk 
as he would prove theft, there would be no removals from the public service 
except for crimes of which the penal law takes cognizance. Consequently, 
removal would be always and justly regarded as a stigma upon character, and 
a man removed from a position in a public office would be virtually branded 
as a convicted criminal. Removal for cause, therefore, if the cause were to be 
decided by any authority but that of the responsible superior officer, instead of 
improving, would swiftly and enormously enhance the cost, and ruin the 
efficiency, of the public service, by destroying subordination, and making every 
lazy and worthless member of it twice as careless and incompetent as he is now. 

If, then, the legitimate cause for removal ought to be determined in public 
as in private business by the responsible appointing power, it is of the highest 
public necessity that the exercise of that power should be made as absolutely 
honest and independent as possible. But how can it be made honest and inde- 
pendent if it is not protected so far as practicable from the constant bribery of 
selfish interest and the illicit solicitation of personal influence? The experience 
of our large patronage offices proves conclusively that the cause of the larger 
number of removals is not dishonest}^ or incompetency ; it is the desire to make 
vacancies to fill. This is the actual cause, whatever cause may be assigned. 
The removals would not be made except for the pressure of politicians. But 
those politicians would not press for removals if they could not secure the ap- 
pointment of their favorites. Make it impossible for them to secure appointment, 
and the pressure would instantly disappear and arbitrary rem.oval cease. 

So long, therefore, as we permit minor appointments to be made by mere 
personal influence and favor, a fixed limited term and removal during that term 
for cause only would not remedy the evil, because the incumbents would still 
be seeking influence to secure reappointment, and the aspirants doing the same 
to replace them. Removal under plea of good cause would be as wanton and 
arbitrary as it is now, unless the power to remove were intrusted to some other 
discretion than that of the superior officer, and in that case the struggle for 
reappointment and the knowledge that removal for the term was practically 
impossible would totally demoralize the service. To make sure, then, that 



300 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

removals shall be made for legitimate cause only, we must provide that appoint- 
ment shall be made only for legitimate cause. 

All roads lead to Rome. Personal influence in appointments can be an- 
nulled only by free and open competition. By that bridge we can return to the 
practice of Washington and to the intention of the Constitution. That is the 
shoe of swiftness and the magic sword by which the President can pierce and 
outrun the protean enemy of sophistry and tradition which prevents him from 
asserting his power. If you say that succcess in a competitive literary examina- 
tion does not prove fitness to adjust customs duties, or to distribute letters, or to 
appraise linen, or to measure molasses, I answer that the reform does not propose 
that fitness shall be proved by a competitive literary examination. It proposes 
to annul personal influence and political favoritism by making appointment 
depend upon proved capacity. To determine this it proposes first to test the 
comparative general intelligence of all applicants and their special knowledge 
of the particular official duties required, and then to prove the practical faculty 
of the most intelligent applicants by actual trial in the performance of the duties 
before they are appointed. If it be still said that success in such a competition 
may not prove fitness, it is enough to reply that success in obtaining the favor of 
some kind of boss, which is the present system, presumptively proves unfitness. 

Nor is it any objection to the reformed system that many efficient officers 
in the service could not have entered it had it been necessary to pass an 
examination ; it is no objection, because their efficiency is a mere chance. They 
were not appointed because of efficiency, but either because they were diligent 
politicians or because they were recommended by diligent politicians. The 
chance of getting efficient men in any business is certainly not diminished by 
inquiry and investigation. * * * 

Mr. President, in the old Arabian story, from the little box upon the sea- 
shore, carelessly opened by the fisherman, arose the towering and haughty 
demon, ever more monstrous and more threatening, who would not crouch 
again. So from the small patronage of the earlier day, from a Civil Service 
dealing with a national revenue of only two million dollars, anH regulated upon 
sound business principles, has sprung the un-American, un-Democratic, un-Re- 
publican system which destroys political independence, honor, and morality, 
and corrodes the national character itself. In the solemn anxiety of this hour 
the warning words of the austere Calhoun, uttered nearly half a century ago, 
echo enstartled recollection like words of doom : " If you do not put this thing 
down it will put you down." Happily it is the historic faith of the race from 
which we are chiefly sprung, that eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. It is 
that faith which has made our mother England the great parent of free States. 



THE SPOILS SYSTEM. 



301 



The same faith has made America the poHtical hope of the world. Fortunately 
removed by our position from the entanglements of European politics, and 
more united and peaceful at home than at any time within the memory of 
living men, the moment is most auspicious for remedying that abuse in our 
political system whose nature, proportions, and perils the whole country begins 
clearly to discern. The will and the power to apply the remedy will be a test 
of the sagacity and the energy of the people. The reform of which I have 
spoken is essentially the people's reform. With the instinct of robbers who run 
with the crowd and lustily cry " Stop thief! " those who would make the public 
service the monopoly of a few favorites denounce the determination to open 
that service to the whole people as a plan to establish an aristocracy. The huge 
ogre of patronage, gnawing at the character, the honor, and the life of the 
country, grimly sneers that the people cannot help themselves and that nothing 
can be done. But much greater things have been done. Slavery was the Giant 
Despair of many good men of the last generation, but slavery was overthrown. 
If the Spoils System, a monster only less threatening than slavery, be uncon- 
([uerable, it is because the country has lost its convictions, its courage, and its 
common sense. " I expect," said the Yankee as he surveyed a stout antagonist, 
'■ 1 expect that you're pretty ugly, but I cal'late I'm a darned sight uglier." I 
know that patronage is strong, but I believe that the American people are very 
much stronger. 

(Delivered before the American Social Science Association at its meeting in Saratoga, New York, Sep- 
tember 8, 1 88 1.) 





302 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Polygamy. 

By GEORGE F. EDMUNDS, of Vermont. 

(Born 1828.) 



iHE Senator from Ohio (Mr. Sherman), I suspect, is quite right in what 
he has said that this measure is very Hkely not to accompHsh all that 
some people might suppose it would accomplish. It ma}- be that the 
domination of this autocracy, hierarchy, theocracy — I use all the terms 
— will still control the political action of the Territory of Utah; but we 
try the mildest of measures first. We take out by this bill from the 
present Government of Utah all of its essential powers, because the statistics and 
the information that we have demonstrate that the Government of the Territory 
of Utah from top to bottom now is and has been for a long time — I do not 
know but all the time — including both houses of its Territorial Assembly, in 
the hands of the polygamists. Every member of its Council but one is a polyg- 
amist glorying in from two to six wives. Every one but two or three of the 
twenty-six members of its House of Representatives is also adorned with that 
distinction. And when you go into the executive ofifices of that Territory, much 
the same thing exists. 

Now this act, if it has no other effect, will have the efifect of displacing from 
political supremacy all the persons whom the laws of the United States for 
twenty years have said were people who ought not to be allowed to carrv on a 
government. It will have that effect provided the President of the United States, 
and the Senate of the United States, his constitutional advisers, select for the 
administrative and judicial offices of that Territory men who are wise enough 
and able enough to enforce the laws; and that, I may say, has been the great 
difficulty for the last twenty years that the Government of the United States 
is far from being free from criticism tipon that point. It will do so much. 

Now if there be in this Mormon church a body of people, as we believe 
there ?re, who have no more faith in this idea of polygamy than any Senator 
who hears me has, as a fact, and who wish to discourage it, and who wish to 
emancipate themselves from the tyranny of this hierarchy that now has its foot 
on their necks, there will be a ch.ance for them to assert themselves. 

It is true that this is something like what the Senator from Georgia and 




George F. Edmunds. 



304 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

some other people have alluded to indirectly; it is one of the twin " relics of bar- 
barism." * * * 

Then, may I not assume that we wish to get rid of it? Everybody says we 
do. How are you going to do it? You say you do not like what we have pro- 
posed. Will you propose something else? Oh, no. It is always some other 
day, some other measure that is not now defined, that is not now brought for- 
ward. It is some other day, some other time, some other measure, than the 
one that is proposed. 

Now I come back to the precise point that we have before us, the essential 
substance of this bill — and I cannot waste my ten minutes in talking about 
constitutional considerations — is that the distinction between the power of the 
people to regulate political rights and their power to deny civil rights is as plain 
as anything can be. In the case of the Constitution of every State in this Union, 
almost, there has always been the provision that no man who is an idiot, a pauper, 
or a lunatic, shall be entitled to vote ; and that question of whether he is entitled 
to vote is not submitted to a judicial tribunal to decide whether he is a pauper or 
an idiot ; but it is decided in the first instance (subject, as in every case, as it is 
here, to an appeal to a judicial tribunal) by the political authority of the State 
in which the question arises. That has existed in, I presume, every State Consti- 
tution. Upon what principle does it stand? It stands upon the principle that 
the body of the people — and that for the Territories is the Congress of the 
United States, and nobody else, for we might abolish them to-morrow — have 
the right to determine who shall exercise a political franchise as distinct from a 
private or civil right. 

The Supreme Court of the United States in the woman suffrage case have 
recognized and affirmed exactly the same proposition that the right to vote, or 
to hold ofifice, is not an inherent right of a citizen, but it is a conventional right 
dependent upon the will of the majority of the community in which the right is 
claimed to exist. That is just what this does. 

Now we come to the practical point. The Government of the Territory 
of Utah, in every one of its practical, administrative, and political aspects, is a 
government of polygamists — not a government of faith or opinion, but a gov- 
ernment of fact. The men who practice that thing are in possession of that 
government ; they are in possession of it in defiance of the statutes of the United 
States punishing that thing ; they are in possession of it in defiance of all civil- 
ized. Christian, modern understanding of what it is right to do, not what it is 
right to think. 

The Committee on the Judiciary recognize to the fullest extent all that 



POLYGAMY. 305 

has been said touching the right of every man and every woman to believe pre- 
cisely what he or she likes. He may be an infidel and believe in nothing; he may 
be of any sect ; he may believe that a hundred wives or no wives are right ; 
he may believe in horse-stealing or whatever he likes. So long as he believes 
merely, he has a right to his opinion ; but when it comes to what he has to do in 
the government of the country, it is a different thing. The horse-thief may 
not sit on a jury where a horse-thief is on trial, if he says, on being asked, that 
he thinks horse-stealing is a Christian duty; and yet some people have talked 
to us the idea that if you exclude horse-thieves from a jury that is to try a 
horse-thief, you have packed the jury. That is not the case, unless it be that 
every jury is packed in a sense. As I said some time ago, each jury, like every 
other agency of government, must believe in the law that they are called upon 
to enforce ; otherwise the law itself becomes a mere mockery, and trial by jury 
a sham. You must in that sense pack it upon one side or the other; and upon 
which side? If you are to have a government at all, you must pack it upon the 
side of the people who believe in the law that they are sworn when they take 
their places in the jury-box that they will faithfully and impartially execute. 
That has existed without statute at the common law; it is the common law 
now ; it is the law of the United States in Utah now, and this jury clause that we 
have in this bill only puts into form and provides convenient methods of carrying 
out exactly what the Supreme Court of the United States has decided that the 
law now is. 

Then you come to the practical point, whether you are willing to deal with 
this question, not as a question of faith at all — for there is no clause in the bill 
that can be tortured into dealing with or affecting any man's faith ; but there 
are clauses in the bill that deal with his conduct, and if his conduct, be it a con- 
duct of faith or conduct of practice without faith, falls within the very principle 
of every organized community of being subject to be dealt with by the authority 
of that community. Nobody questions that ; and when you deprive the pauper 
in Illinois or Vermont or Georgia of the right to vote, you do not say that he 
must be convicted of pauperism by a judicial trial in advance. You say that the 
political authority must decide, in the first instance, whether he is a pauper or 
not. If that political authority decides wrongfully against him, and his vote 
turns the question of how the election is to go, the judicial authorities come 
into play and put the right man in his place. That is exactly the effect of this bill. 

So then, sir, we come back to the question of whether the Congress of the 
United States is willing to deal with the fact of a polygamous government in a 
Territory of the United States over which, I assume — because I cannot go into 
this constitutional or so-called constitutional argument — the United States has 



3o6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

supreme control as to its political character. That is all there is to it. If we 
have that control which I assume, then the question is whether, saying all of us 
that we are against the practice of polygamy, and do not believe that a polyga- 
mous community ought to be entitled to carry on the government as a polyga- 
mous government, we shall put the ofBces of that community into the hands 
of those who are not polygamists. That is all there is to it, and there is nothing 
more to it that can be stated. If you do not want to do it, if you wish things 
to go on as they are, let them go. It is for the Senate to determine. 

More than that and beyond that, it is not the mere practice of polygamy, 
bad as it is, but that happens to be an inherent and controlling force in the most 
intense and anti-republican hierarchy, theocracy, as an organized and systematic 
government that, so far as my small reading has gone, has ever existed on the 
face of the earth. The Church of Latter-day Saints, a corporation organized 
under the authority of law, controls in every respect every step in the territorial 
operations of that community. The three presidents, by step after step, the three 
first presidents, as they are called, but I believe that the last one of those is 
the absolute ruler, in point of fact — you may disguise it and gloss it, as you 
please- — of the destiny and the fate of that people, polygamists. Mormons who 
are not polygamists, and Gentiles. Is that republican? Can you tolerate in 
the heart of this continent of republics the building up of a State of that char- 
acter? That is the question. If you cannot tolerate it, and have the power 
to dispose of it, are you willing to exert that power? That is the question. This 
bill is one step, only one step, to that end. The Committee on the Judiciary 
have under consideration other and further measures, which I hope we shall 
report in due time, which will make up and supplement this measure, to eradi- 
cate, as far as just government may, not any man's faith or opinion, but to bring 
the political community that exists within the boundaries of that Territory into its 
republican relations with the great Republic that surrounds it. That is all. 

You can always find reasons and flaws and difficulties for not doing a thing 
if you do not wish to do it, and the Committee on the Judiciary do not suppose 
that this measure alone is sure to have the effect that some people imagine it is 
to have; but we hope that this Senate, before it is through with this business, will 
do all — and that will be sufficient — that the absolute political power of this 
Government has within its reach to accomplish the purpose, not of breaking 
down any man's faith or his opinions, but making the practice of the Government 
of the Territory of Utah and of its inhabitants conformable to what is essential 
to the republican safety of every one of the States of this Union, and the repub- 
lican safety of them all under the Union of the United States. 

(From a speech delivered in the United States Senate, February 16, 1882.) 



SILVER. 307 



Sliver. 




By WILLIAM BOURKE COCKRAN, of New York. 

(Born 1854,) 



R. SPEAKER : After the very interesting address which we have just 
heard, nobody will deny that the argument for free silver coinage 
may be made picturesque, even if it fail to be convincing. 

Sir, when the gavel of the presiding ofiticer descended upon the 
desk of this House on the 4th of March last, and members of Con- 
gress returned to their homes, they found the country blessed with 
universal prosperity. Everywhere the fires of content blazed upon the hearth- 
stones ; the light of hope illumined every household ; yet, in a period when 
everything that ought to produce prosperity was ours, the skies over our heads 
became somber, the dark cloud of a panic settled down over the length and 
breadth of the land, wrapping in its sinister folds countless thousands of Ameri- 
can citizens, threatening to send the gaunt specter of starvation stalking over 
American highways, menacing the cottages that shelter American labor. 

When we seek the source of the dangers that are now impending over us, 
we can find nothing in the character of providential interposition to prevent our 
continued march toward prosperity. Our bursting granaries show that Provi- 
dence has smiled upon us in seed time and in harvest; yet, in every section of 
the country, mills are closing, industry is suspended, the public mind is dis- 
turbed with apprehensions that, during the coming winter, our highways will 
be thronged, not with tramps who shirk work, but with industrious laboring 
men, vainly seeking a market for their labor. There is reason to fear that self- 
respecting men and women, who have been active forces in the production of 
our national wealth, may be forced to taste the bitter and humiliating bread of 
charity. When we see ourselves surrounded by these grave perils, and realize 
that our condition cannot be attributed to the frown of Providence, we are 
forced to the conclusion that we must be suffering from the folly of man in 
the form of a vicious system of laws, which, in a time of bountiful production, 
has deranged and paralyzed the whole machinery of distribution. 

I do not agree with my friend from Maine (Mr. Reed) in his conclusion 
that financial crises are mysterious but unavoidable incidents in the progress 



3o8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of the human race. I believe that every commercial disturbance can be traced 
to settled and well-defined causes, and that this panic has been produced by 
vicious monetary laws, just as the panic of 1837, the panic of 1857, and the panic 
of 1873 were produced, by unsound systems of finance. And a condition which 
has been produced by bad laws can be remedied by wise laws. 

The President of the United States has called us together at a period of 
intense heat to apply a remedy to the evil from which this country suffers, and 
he suggests that the disasters which threaten us have their root in the operation 
of the act of 1890, known as the Sherman Silver Law. A proposition to repeal 
the purchasing clause of that act has been submitted to this House, and we 
have a series of substitutes offered for it — one a proposition for free coinage of 
silver, with an assortment of ratios, and the other a proposition to revive the 
Bland act. 

When we scrutinize the arguments that have been offered in support of these 
amendments, I believe we may reduce them to two — one that the Democratic 
party, by its platform adopted at Chicago, declared in favor of free coinage of 
silver, and the other that, if the amendment proposed by the gentleman from 
Missouri be adopted, the value of silver will be increased so that it will circulate 
freely on a parity with gold at a ratio of sixteen to one. 

Mr. Speaker, I do not join in the tone of levity with which the platform of the 
Democratic party has been treated in some quarters. I believe that a declaration 
of political principles is binding upon a political party, and when I stand here 
to-day opposed to this measure of free coinage, I stand on the Democratic plat- 
form with both feet, and he who seeks to pass such an act in the name of the 
Democratic party is trying to push me off the Democratic platform and to place 
me on the Populist platform. I assisted in the deliberations of the Democratic 
convention; and, Mr. Speaker, the good humor which that remark provokes 
induces me to say that I had a good opportunity to discover with what vigor 
it set its foot upon opposition when any person undertook to interfere with 
its settled purpose. 

I remember, sir, that when the financial plank of the platform was under 
consideration, a delegate from Colorado proposed as an amendment the insertion 
of the word " free " before the word " coinage," and supported it in a speech 
of about an hour's duration, and did not poll ten votes for it on the floor when the 
convention took final action upon the proposition. * * * 

The Democratic party did declare for the use of both metals as money ; and, 
sir, while I am opposed to the free coinage of silver, I am equally opposed to the 
total demonetization of silver. 




William Bourke Cockran. 



3IO MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Silver is a part of the world's money, and it is and always will be a part of 
the money of every country, but there can never be a bimetallic standard of 
value in any one country. There never has been and there never will be. 

Mr. Speaker, we have heard it said here, and it is the principal delusion 
cherished by our friends who support the amendments offered to this bill, that 
there was bimetallism in this country prior to 1873, ^^^ ^^^-^ there was bimetal- 
lism in France from 1803 to 1873. Now, I venture to state that, while there was 
free coinage of both metals in these two countries, there never was bimetallism 
in either, in the sense of the two metals circulating- together. These two metals 
have never been, at one and the same time, the standard of value in any country, 
and, in the nature of things, one metal must always be the standard of value. 
This proposition was laid down by Locke, in 1695, when the principles of finance 
were still obscure, and when the experience of the human race, in a high state 
of civilization, had not contributed to the sum of human knowledge upon the 
subject. In one of the papers which Locke contributed to the discussions which 
preceded the recoinage in England, at the close of the seventeenth century, he 
said: 

" Two metals, as gold and silver, cannot be the measure of commerce both 
together in any country, becaur the measure of commerce must be perpetu- 
ally the same, invariable, and Tceeping the same proportion of value in all its 
parts. But so only metal does or can do itself; so silver is to silver and gold 
to gold. An ounce of silver is always of equal value to an ounce of silver, and 
an ounce of gold to an ounce of gold ; and two ounces of the one or other of 
double the value of an ounce of the same. But gold and silver change their 
value one to another, for, supposing them to be in value as sixteen to one now, 
perhaps the next month they may be as fifteen and three-quarters or fifteen and 
seven-eighths to one. And one may as well take a measure, z'. g., a yard whose 
parts lengthen and shrink, as a measure of trade of materials that have not always 
a settled, invariable value to one another." 

And that doctrine was repeated by Mill, one hundred and fifty years after- 
ward, when he said: 

" The plan of a double standard is still occasionally brought forward by, here 
and there, a writer or orator as a great improvement in the currency. It is 
probable that, with most of its adherents, its chief merit is its tendency to a sort 
of depreciation, there being, at all times, abundance of supporters for any mode, 
either open or covert, of lowering the standard." * * * 

And again : 

" The particular kind of variation to which the cun ency is rendered more 



SILVER. 



311 



liable by having two legal standards is a fall of value, or what is commonly 
called a depreciation, since, practically, that one of the two metals will always be 
the standard, of which the real has fallen below the rated value." 

Mr. Speaker, these are the speculations and conclusions of the two chief 
philosophers who have written on this subject. And what Locke declared, what 
Mill repeats, is attested by the experience of the whole human race. I make 
the statement here now — and I challenge my friend from Missouri (Mr. Bland) 
to contradict it, familiar as he is with the historical development of this ques- 
tion — that never in the history of the world have these two metals circulated 
side by side as a double standard of value. They never will so circulate and they 
never can. Let us take the experience on this subject of the three leading 
countries of the world — Great Britain, France, and the United States. * * * 

(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, August 26, 1893.) 




312 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Silver. 



By THOMAS B. REED, of Maine. 

(Born 1839.) 




IMETALLISM by a single nation does not seem to be possible; 
bimetallism by all the nations of the world seems to me to be not only 
possible, but feasible. As I understand it, the object of bimetallism, 
and the avowed object of monometallism is to have a stable and per- 
sistent standard. The theory of the monometallist is that gold of itself 
is subject to less fluctuation, to less change than silver, to less fluctua- 
tion and change than both gold and silver together. 

The theory of the bimetallist is that if two lakes, liable to be disturbed by 
different causes, can be connected and made to flow into each other inter- 
changeably, they will present a much greater expanse, and any change of level 
will, therefore, be much less — the change in each lake being distributed over 
both. 

I can understand this theory as applied to the metallic standards of the 
world. I can understand that if gold by any accident should be undervalued 
in any country and driven out of that country, that would send it to the other 
countries ; and the effect of that surplus of gold in the other countries would 
be to lower the price of gold, and, therefore, have a tendency to send it back to 
the original country ; in other words, that the effect of the two lakes would be to 
cause a lesser variation in the level ; but when you come to apply that doctrine 
to a single country, you will perceive at once that it cannot be applicable, that 
the effect of undervaluing one metal will necessarily be to drive that metal out of 
the country. 

You do not have to indulge in any far-fetched theories to understand this. 
You do not have to discviss the question of the Gresham law at all. All you 
have to do is to apply yourself to the history of the United States ; and the 
speech of the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Patterson), a brave and admirable 
speech, shows conclusively that this country, while it was pretending to be bi- 
metallic in its standard, was never really so ; that one metal drove the other out 




Thomas B. Reed. 



314 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of the country; that the standard was not possible of maintenance as long as 
there was an overvaluation. 

Now, to-day the proposition is that we shall undervalue gold over forty per 
cent. If three cents on a dollar of undervaluation of silver drove silver out of 
this country, what will an undervaluation of forty cents on a dollar do for gold? 
Does anybody have any question or doubt about it? Not the least. But you 
say if we undertake to establish a gold standard in this country, first, we will 
demonetize silver and drive it out of existence ; and, second, we will raise the 
debts which the people owe to some persons unknown, presumably enemies, 
who ought to be despoiled. 

This first charge would be a serious one if it were true. If the adoption of 
a gold standard destroyed the uses of silver, it would certainly be a very grave 
misfortune to this country. In the first place, it would destroy a productive in- 
dustry of this country. For my part, I am never willing to do that. Second, 
it would destroy an industry which, in my judgment, is of more value to this 
country than a merely productive industry. 

To my belief the regions beyond the Missouri river will one day or other 
constitute comparatively the great riches of this country. It would not be possi- 
ble for me to prove this. It would not be possible for me to demonstrate this, 
perhaps, even to the people who live beyond the Missouri ; but I have an abiding 
faith that such is the case. The wonderful possibilities of their soil has never 
been appreciated even by themselves. I believe that the settlement and the 
growth of this country depend greatly upon its mining interests. 

I have, therefore, been ready all my life, by duties on lead, and by any action 
upon the silver question which seemed to me to be adequate and suitable to 
promote those industries ; and I should be sorry to believe that the maintenance 
of a gold standard would cause them permanent harm. I do not believe that the 
maintenance of a gold standard in any way militates against the reasonable use of 
silver as a coinage metal. The question whether there is to be a double standard 
or a single standard is entirely different from the question of the use of silver 
as money. 

We have purchased, and have now in the vaults of the United States Treas- 
ury Department, thousands of tons of silver, yet there never has been a moment 
of time since 1872 when the standard has not been gold; the standard to-day is 
gold. The repealing of the purchasing clause of the Sherman act, therefore, 
would not in any way establish a different one. The continuance of the pur- 
chases under the Sherman act would, in the estimation of the world, be a declara- 
tion that we intended to go on with our purchases to such an extent that we 
v/ould find ourselves upon a silver basis after no great lapse of time. 



SILVER. 315 

Now, whatever this country may desire to do — whatever its intentions are 
for the future — one thing seems to be clear : If the people are to go upon a 
silver basis, they want to know that they are going to do so, and want to do it 
deliberately. If the plain question were presented to every American citizen 
whether he desired that this country should be upon a silver basis alone, gold 
being banished, the great majority of answers would be no. And this ground 
they would take without abating a jot their determination to coin and use both 
metals. 

The next difficulty which we have to meet is the assertion that by the repeal 
of the Sherman act, we increase the burden of the debt upon the borrower. 
This would certainly be a very grave misfortune, if it were true. The business 
of borrowing, and the business of lending are alike honorable. Such transactions 
arise out of the nature of man's needs. Some men prefer a certain gain to the 
chances of great profit. 

Some men are willing to take the chance of the profit and pay the small 
gain which is necessary in order to obtain the stored-up wealth of another. Men 
who have money may not have enterprise and brains. Men who have brains and 
enterprise do not always have money. Borrowing and lending marries money 
and brains, to the great advancement of the world. If we were to make a law 
which only related to a single series of transactions, such as now exist in the 
United States, it might possibly be an advantage to the borrower to have the 
payment so adjusted that he would have the advantage of the transaction; but 
when the present race of borrowers is dead, or when the present borrowers have 
paid their money, there will still be forever a borrowing and lending world. 

In order to constitute the transaction of borrowing and lending, the first 
thing is the lender. Until he is willing to lend, the transaction cannot by any 
possibility take place. The first thing to do is to coax the lender to lend. After 
that, borrowing is possible, and not until then is it possible. 

Hence, laws must be made so as to enable the lender to be satisfied of the 
certainty of return. If there is any uncertainty with regard to that, before he 
lends he will demand some advantage which corresponds to that doubt con- 
nected with the repayment. Money paid for the use of other money, in the 
nature of interest, is a different thing from money paid for the use of other 
money in the nature of a risk. 

A man will lend you money for five per cent, where there is no risk, and 
it may be he will not lend it to you for a hundred where there is ; consequently, 
if you make your laws in such fashion that the borrower has an advantage in 
payment, the lender will be sure to demand an advantage in lending, and gen- 
erally, guch an advantage as will cover all the chances. If you could make a 



3i6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

man absolutely sure to-day in any part of the United States that what he loans 
out would certainly come back to him, you would lower the rate of interest a 
great many per cent, everywhere. 

Therefore, any law which is made to reach the case of the lender and the 
borrower must be made in the spirit of fairness and of justice ; and any proposi- 
tion to a man to lend you money upon one standard to be paid upon another 
will necessarily be accompanied with such a rate of interest as will make up for 
the possibility of the lowering of that standard. 

Hence, it cannot be to the advantage of anybody to have unjust laws made 
between the borrower and the lender ; it is just as essential to the borrower that 
the transaction should be as fair as it is to the lender. 

I do not propose, however, to discuss the debt question at any length. That 
would be more suitable in a discussion such as may take place when our whole 
financial system is remodeled. These observations on delator and creditor I 
make merely to supplement the admirable statement of the gentleman from 
Mississippi (Mr. Catchings). I might go on and discuss the proposition to re- 
establish the Bland act, but Senator Hoar, in his most excellent speech else- 
where, has shown that that act is worse than the one under which we are now 
living. Certain it is that had not the decline of the national bank circulation 
kept equal pace with the issue of the Bland dollar, that act would have long ago 
landed us where we are now. 

The proposition to lower the ratio I hail as the one good sign of this dis- 
cussion. To drop from the bigoted determination that sixteen to one is a heaven- 
appointed ratio, raised up by the Almighty, and proceed even to discuss market 
values, seems to give some slight hope that when we really undertake anew to 
reform our financial system we may approach it with some reference to existing 
conditions and to the facts of the universe. As for the propositions now before 
us, we can all see that they are untenable. No one believes that we could main- 
tain twenty to one any easier than sixteen to one without the aid of the rest of 
the world. 

What, then, is the pathway of duty? The unconditional repeal. That will 
either give relief or not. Tf not. then we must try something else, and the sooner 
the better. It is a matter of deep regret to all sensible men that we have delayed 
so long. Men are to-day struggling almost against fate and praying for relief. 
The banks are strained almost to the point of breaking. It is such a pity that we 
had to waste so much time in this weary welter of talk. 

(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, August 26, 1893.) 




THE PARTING OF THE WAYS. 317 



The Parting of the Ways. 

By RICHARD P. BLAND, of Missouri. 

(Born 1835, died 1899.) 



HY, Mr. Speaker, I say right here (and history will bear me out in 
the statement) that while there was some alarm in the country before, 
yet the moment the British Government demonetized silver in India, 
then the panic began in earnest — not before ; that precipitated this 
panic in its present shape. We all understand that. In this way 
desolation was brought into many of the States of the Union, and 
men who had before been prosperous and happy were by the thousands sent 
as tramps throughout the land. 

All parts of the country have felt the effect. It is this fight upon silver 
that has precipitated this panic ; and the repeal of the Sherman law will only 
intensify it, not relieve it. The panic will be relieved when everything gets 
so low that people see they can make money by buying ; when they begin to 
buy, prices will go up ; and when everybody is buying, money will come from 
its hoarding places and you will have some relief. In no other way will relief 
come. 

Gold is coming to us to-day. Notwithstanding we are told the people 
across the water are afraid to invest here for fear that we will not pay in gold, 
yet these people are sustaining prices to-day and sending here all the money 
that they can spare. There was a panic in gold-using Australia that has bank- 
rupted that whole people and sent terror to the banks all over England. We 
know that gold cannot be obtained thece except by paying for it; yet it is 
coming here. 

Talk about a premium on gold; here is the Treasury of the United States 
that is open to the plunder of every speculator in the civilized world. He can 
take his Sherman note or his greenback or any other Government currency 
there and get gold without cost. Did you ever notice the names of these gen- 
tlemen in New York who are shipping the gold abroad, or bringing it back? 
Every one of those names that I have seen has a foreign termination; every 



3i8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

one of those gentlemen, so far as I am advised, is an agent or branch bank of 
some bank across the water. 

If you go to the Bank of England to get gold for export you must pay a 
premium on it; if you go to the Bank of France to get gold for export you 
must pay a premium on it. The case is the same with every other banking- 
house in Europe; no gold can be obtained there without paying a premium. 
But here is the Treasury of the United States professing to be so helpless that 
it cannot prevent every gold speculator from robbing the Government of its 
gold. Our Treasury will not pay out the silver which it might pay. 

The Bank of France will pay out silver, or will charge a premium on gold 
if it is wanted for anything but domestic use. But the Treasury of the United 
States, instead of paying out gold and silver in equal quantities and thus pre- 
serving its gold (if it is necessary to preserve it, though I see no necessity of 
preserving it, for all our money is at a premium to-day), lets everybody go 
there and get as much gold as he pleases. Why not pay out the silver when 
we have more of it than we have of gold, or pay out gold when we have more 
of it than silver, and thus protect ourselves? 

It is because the Administration is hostile to silver; and thus it is sur- 
rendering this country to the Shylocks of the Old World who have made war 
upon it. The aristocracy of Western Europe has absolutely tabooed silver in 
those countries ; driven it away from there. Here it finds its only resting place. 
The last fight for the white metal is to be made here in this country and in 
this House, my friends. Wfll you stand by it now, or will you let the Shylocks 
come and have their way? It is for you to determine. 

I think, Mr. Speaker, that we can trust the people of this country on a 
question of as vital importance as this. The question is now before us. This 
is its last resort. Will you virtually demonetize the money of nearly seventy 
millions of people, with a vast empire of three million square miles, a people 
thirsting for money to open up new railroads, to establish new factories, to 
operate new places of business, to inaugurate new industries ; seventy millions 
of people demanding money, twice what we have to-day, a new people, a new 
country, a free people, or they are or ought to be free whether they are or not ? 

Are you to give up the fight and let this vast body of our wealth go to 
ruin? I do not believe it. We know well enough that if we repeal this law 
and give nothing for it, the people of this country will regard it as a total 
demonetization of silver, which it will be so far as this Congress is concerned, 
without "any question. 

Now, my friends — and I do not care whether you are Democrats or 
Republicans, or who you are, but I appeal to you, especially as Democrats — 




Richard P. Bland. 



320 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

when in 1890 in nearly every State of this Union the Democratic party in its 
platforms demanded free and unlimited coinage of silver, when you embodied 
it in your great Chicago national platform, when the Democratic party has for 
years stood before the House and the country as the bulwark in defense of 
the white metal, in the face of all these things are you now to desert the cause 
and surrender the fight ? Can you afiford to do it ? Will you go to your people 
and tell them that you are not able to carry out the pledges of your platform, 
the promises upon which you were sent here, or any part of it, except that 
which resulted in the total demonetization of silver and the sacrifice of their 
interests ? 

What does free coinage of silver mean ? It means that the holders of 
silver bullion, at some ratio to be fixed in the bill, may go to the mints of the 
Government and have it struck into the legal-tender money of the country and 
deposit the dollars so coined, if the holder so desires, and have a certificate 
issued to him in place of it. What is the effect of unlimited coinage of silver 
in this country, and I invite your attention to this particularly, because it is a 
question of vital importance? It means that the silver coins of the United 
States at whatever ratio is fixed, and I want the present ratio that we have now, 
sixteen to one, maintained precisely as it is, it means that the silver of the 
world can come here in exchange for what we have to sell. 

Yes, it means that the silver of the whole world can come here. But they 
say that we will be flooded with the world's silver, that it will be dumped down 
upon us. Now, let us see about that for a moment. It means that anyone 
with sixteen ounces of silver can come here from any part of the world, or 
with one ounce of gold, and he can buy your grain, he can buy your house and 
lot, he can buy your manufactured product, and buy the property and com- 
modities of all sorts that you have to sell with either the one or the other ; that 
is to say, he can buy just as much with his sixteen ounces of silver as with his 
one ounce of gold. 

With the billions upon billions of property existing in this country to-day, 
and being produced in this country every year, we simply offer to exchange 
that which we have in abundance on a basis of one pound of gold as the equiva- 
lent of sixteen pounds of silver. We invite, then, the world to come with its 
silver and make the exchange. No nation now, it is true, ofifers in exchange 
for silver the gold at any fixed ratio ; consequently all the silver that is coined 
is used in the countries where it is coined. And why? Because no great 
power offers to exchange commodities for one metal or the other at any fixed 
ratio. That is the only trouble with silver to-day. 

Now, it must be remembered that France gave an example to the world 



THE PARTING OF THE WAYS. 



321 



in this regard, having kept its silver on a parity with gold for a period of 
seventy years on a ratio of fifteen and one-half to one. It said to the nations 
of the world, " Come with your gold and your silver, fifteen and one-half ounces 
of silver or one of gold, and you can buy all of our salable property in France 
and you can pay us in silver or in gold; just as you choose, on that basis." 
And according to the report of the British Royal Commission of 1888 on that 
subject, France was enabled to maintain the parity of the two metals at that 
ratio, for the reason that she had property enough to effect exchanges on that 
basis. We are in the same condition. 

What is it, then, that you are asked to do? It is that we, the Govern- 
ment of the United States, we as a people say to all the world, especially the 
silver-using people, all of the Asiatic nations and the Great Indies, come here 
with your white metal if you choose to come, and trade with us on the basis 
of sixteen to one and buy your commodities from us at that ratio. When you 
do that, will not the silver-using people of the world come to our shores to 
make their purchases rather than go to the European powers, where they 
demand a ratio of from twenty-two to twenty-five There can be no doubt of 
the answer to that question. 



(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, August ii, 1893.) 




322 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Contested Election Case of Patterson vs. 

Carmack. 




By JOHN M. ALLEN, of Mississippi. 

(Born 1847.) 



'HE gentleman from Pennsylvania told us in opening his speech with 
what unbiased minds the majority of the committee approached the 
consideration of this case; how destitute of prejudice or partisan feel- 
ing they were when they began ; how they just started out to find the 
right between these two Democrats. Surely, Mr. Speaker, the gentle- 
man did protest too much. (Laughter.) The longer I live the more 
I am impressed with the necessity for watching the man that doth protest too 
much, especially when he protests his non-partisanship. 

The protestations of the gentleman from Pennsylvania are but another 
lesson to me to " look out for snakes " when I run up against such an absolutely 
pure and honest non-partisan. (Laughter and applause.) If he started out as 
a non-partisan, as he says he did, he became a partisan and got entangled in his 
" arrangements " further, quicker, and harder than any man I ever knew. 
(Laughter.) I am too honest to make any such claim for myself. (Laughter.) 
I confess I started into the case with some partisan feeling. 

Mr. Speaker, the contestant, in his speech to-day, devoted much of his time 
to the statement of his position on the financial question, and the gentleman 
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Kirkpatrick) told us about the contestant's long and 
consistent position on this question. The gentleman does not seem to be any 
more familiar with " Uncle Josiah's " record on the financial question than he is 
with the real facts in this case. 

Colonel Patterson has given expression in his life to some very sound and 
patriotic sentiments on the silver question. It has only been a few years ago 
since he canvassed the State of Tennessee and advocated the free and unlimited 
coinage of silver, and when he wished to stir up the indignation of the people 
against the Republican party, he would take a silver dollar and, holding it this 
way — not having the dollar, I must use a penny — he would say: " My fellow 




John M. Allen. 



324 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

citizens, there she is ; look at her — never disgraced but twice in the history of 
the world ; once by Judas Iscariot, the other time by the Republican party." 
(Laughter.) 

That speech would have to be amended now, and it would have to be said 
that silver had been disgraced three times — first by Judas Iscariot, next by the 
Republican party, and last by Josiah Patterson. (Laughter.) Now, understand 
that I am not asking to have this case decided on the financial issue. I did not 
get up to make a silver speech. I do not think this case ought to go off on 
the issue between gold and silver, for if it did it could be decided either way 
as to the contestant, for he has been on every side. 

He is largely responsible for the strong silver and anti-Republican sentiment 
in Tennessee, for they are Christian people in Tennessee, and they have strong 
prejudices against Judas Iscariot; and since Colonel Patterson mi.xed the Repub- 
lican party up with Judas Iscariot in the disgrace of silver, it has created some 
prejudice among those Christian people against the Republican party, and you 
can see why these good people, thus taught, should be shy of voting the Repub- 
lican ticket. Understand, I am not putting yovi in company with Judas ; only 
telling where your new-found friend put you. (Laughter.) 

Mr. Speaker, before I went into politics, I gave some attention to law. 
I was pretty well up on the law of estoppel. The gentleman from North Caro- 
lina (Mr. Linney), who, I am sorry to see, is not in his seat to-day. said here, 
some time ago, that Lord Coke said that an estoppel against an estoppel puts 
the matter at large. (Great Isughter and applause.) But I propose to put a 
number of estoppels against the gentleman to whom we have just listened, Col- 
onel Patterson, and to put him at large. 

I propose to show that, if the law of estoppel is applied to him, he has no 
right to a seat on this floor. His contention is that some negroes who wanted 
to vote for him were defrauded of their right to do so, and that others who did 
vote for him had their votes counted for the contestee. While we deny these 
charges, I propose to show that, if they were true, it does not lie in the mouth 
of contestant to object, and that he is estopped from doing so. 

I will show that, of all the men in the United States, he is the last man who 
has the right to claim an election to any position by negro votes ; that he has 
always contended that the negro was unfit to vote, had no right to vote ; that, 
though such right might be conferred on him by law, it ought not to be counted ; 
that he has been the Napoleon of the doctrine of white supremacy ; or, in other 
words, that he is to this question what Bob Fitzsimmons is to the prize ring, 
and that he is to the negro as a voter what General Weyler was to a Cuban 



ELECTION CASE OF PATTERSON vs. CARMACK. 325 

reconcentrado ; that he has preached the right of the white man to dominate the 
negro in poHtics, in season and out of season, and has been the greatest Hving 
apostle of the doctrine that there was a law higher than the Constitution, when 
the Constitution sought to make the negro the political equal of the white man. 

When first elected to Congress, he was elected as the great champion of 
the free and unlimited coinage of silver, and the great bellwether of the doc- 
trine that the white man must dominate the ballot-box. I remember very well 
his first great effort on the floor. It was in the Fifty-second Congress, and, as 
I remember, the House was in Committee of the Whole on some appropriation 
bill. The contestant in this case got the floor and delivered one of his great 
orations. I think I am the only man that listened to him. (Laughter.) 

I wish you could have heard him that day. He stood right over there ; 
he seemed to think that speech would revolutionize public sentiment throughout 
the North on the question of the negro in politics. He met the question boldly, 
and there was about him a sort of air that said his Southern Democratic col- 
leagues had not fully understood the question, and were too timid in its presen- 
tation. I have the speech here. Let me see if I can pick out some of the mild 
compliments he paid the negro as a political factor : 

" The negro himself realizes his impotency and unfitness for government." 

After speaking of the political revolution throughout the South, which put 
the negro politically in the background, he said : 

" And, without question, he peacefully recognized his white neighbor as the 
proper governing agency. The movement throughout the South resulted in a 
better feeling between the races, and kindly relations were restored." * * * 

"'Midnight meetings, accompanied with fife and drum, were things of the 
past. The negro could no longer lean on the Freedman's Bureau, draw rations, 
and spend his days in idleness. He began to learn the lesson of self-reliance, and 
to realize that he was confronted with the responsibilities which freedom and 
independence of action bring to all men. The result was that he at once became 
a more peaceful, industrious, and useful citizen." 

Again he says : 

" The attitude of the Republican party to the races in the South is heart- 
less and exasperating to the last degree. No other motive seems to actuate it 
except the lust of power and the greed of men who have been fattened and 
enriched by the means of prostitution of the powers of government for their 
benefit." 

That is you, gentlemen of the Republican party, he is talking about. 
(Laughter.) Hear him again: 



326 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

" All over the South the negro's thriftlessness, ignorance, and indisposition 
or inaptitude to take care of his own afifairs is heard. In such cases, the white 
man will assert his superior intelligence, courage, and manhood at every hazard, 
and hold the reins of government. I protest against the further governmental 
interference or tinkering with it. I protest against the efforts of the Republican 
party to make it subservient to political and partisan ends." 

You see, after denouncing the negro and complimenting the white man, 
he boldly asserted on this floor that the white man would assert his superior 
intelligence and courage and manhood, and hold the reins of government at 
every hazard. When the bill to repeal the Federal Election Law came up in 
this House on September 30, 1893, you should have heard him thunder then. 
He spoke with a " mighty power and a great ambition." I will now give you a 
few extracts from that speech : 

"As soon expect Irishmen to forget the ' curse of Cromwell ' as for my 
people to forget ' carpet-bag ' governments in the South. I say. and we might 
as well talk plainly about this thing, the history of that period absolutely demon- 
strates that the negro race, at this stage of its development, is incapable of self- 
government, and that universal negro suffrage is impracticable." * * * * 

There is much more of this sort of talk in the Record, but I will not take 
the time to read it. These were his conservative utterances on the floor, but 
were nothing to compare with his bold declarations in the cloakroom. 
(Laughter.) 

The law, Mr. Speaker, recognizes two kinds of estoppels, estoppel by the 
Record and estoppel m pais. Now, I have given some of the Record estoppels. 
These extracts I have just read are from the Record. Here you see Record 
marked on the book. (Great laughter.) 

Now, let us see about the estoppel in pais. In Fayette county, in which 
most of these frauds are alleged to have taken place, at a Confederate reunion, 
September 11, 1889, the contestant made a speech, in which he said: 

" The fact is, he (the negro) prefers to live with the people of the South 
than with any other; would rather work for them and would sooner look to them 
than anyone else for favors and kindness. Invariably, he is manipulated in his 
political movements by white men who have generally forfeited the respect of 
their neighbors, and who care nothing for the negro but to advance their own 
interests or ambition. 

" This necessarily brings attrition, and the danger line is sometimes reached. 
(The truth is, that everywhere throughout the South the white man asserts his 
intelligence and capacity for self-government, and the negro never questions his 



ELECTION CASE OF PATTERSON vs. CARMACK. 327 

right to the ascendancy, if let alone. Go into any county in the South, no 
matter how large the negro majority, and unless you find about the county seat 
a coterie of white men who lead, direct, or inspire the negro to actively participate 
in politics, they are altogether indifferent, and leave it to the white people to 
manage the affairs of the Government. Even the educated negro will remain 
quiet unless he is backed up by the leadership of white men." * * * 

" When asked by what legal or constitutional right the white man asserts 
his supremacy, we answer, ' There is a higher law,' and appeal to that unwritten 
law of civilization which is recorded in Heaven and registered in the heart of 
every brave man, and which has been observed in all ages, in every land, and on 
every sea, and it is that intelligence, virtue, and manhood should rule the world." 

So much for the reunion speech. In his speech on the repeal of the Fed- 
eral Election Laws, the contestant volunteered the information that he 
had volunteered his services to defend such parties in the district as were 
charged in the Federal court with violation of the election laws, and the record 
shows that Judge Jackson, in trying these cases, had to reprove contestant and 
warn the jury against contestant's appeal tO' a " law higher than the Constitution " 
in making the defense of men charged with defrauding the negroes of their right 
to vote. 

Furthermore, most of the witnesses produced by contestant in this case 
have sworn that they had stuffed ballot-boxes in the interest of contestant in 
the previous elections, and that many of them had been defended by him in the 
Federal court for so doing. Now, these are some of the estoppels in pais that 
I set up against contestant. 

(From a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, Friday, April 22, 1898.) 





328 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Race Problem. 

By HENRY WATTERSON, of Kentucky. 

(Born 1840.) 

iWO dangers seem to me at this time to threaten the integrity of the 
Union and the prosperity of the people. One of these is the gospel 
of force, and the other is the doctrine of protection. The first is ex- 
pected to hold the country while its fellow skins it, and to both the 
Republican party has committed itself. 

I wish that it were otherwise. I wish that I could see in the Re- 
publicanism of to-day some reflection of the spirit which animated a Garrison 
and inspired a Whittier, and brought forth in the authors of the anti-slavery 
movement a modern and a native race of Paladins for a thousand years of song 
and story. I wish that the men who have succeeded Lincoln and Seward, Chase 
and Sumner, Fessenden, Trumbull and Greeley in command possessed a little 
of their moderation and patriotism. When I seek for them I encovmter in their 
places another and a different set of leaders ; I am chilled by the implacable 
hostility of a Sherman and a Hoar; I am amazed by the vindictive and sensa- 
tional outcries of an Ingalls and a Chandler ; I stand aghast before the shameless 
intrepidity of a Quay, and I find all progress toward the light and warmth of 
truth completely blocked by the adventurous and unfeeling obesity of a Reed. 
In my despair I am almost tempted to exclaim — 

" O, for a LODGE in some vast wilderness. 
Where rumor of oppression and deceit 

Might never reach me more." 

But here again, saddest of all, when I look for independent thinking and 
the faithful discharge of early promise, I see the aspiring young man of letters 
turned into the ambitious politician, forgetting in the selfish aims of to-day the 
disinterested beliefs of yesterday. 

The advocates of extreme measures for the South make a very strong and 
plausible case ; indeed, the chief defect about it is that, as was the constitutional 




Henry Watterson. 



330 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

right of ownership in man, it is too good a case. They set forth the fact that 
the negro has the constitutional right to vote ; that by one means and another 
this right is denied him, and that it is the duty of the Government to protect 
all its citizens in all their rights. It is so easy to assert our rights ; so easy to 
tell our own side of the story ! There is not a black man in Boston who has not 
the same right that you and I have to come and go at will ; to occupy the best 
rooms at the hotels ; to sit in the stage-boxes of the theaters ; to hold the choicest 
pews in the churches. But what would happen if the blacks should flock in 
overwhelming numbers to the hotels, the theaters and the churches? And 
what would the white people of Boston think, what would they do, if a hostile 
party, having a chance majority in Congress, should pass a law, setting forth 
the black man's constitutional right of civil equality, creating a system of ma- 
chinery to enforce it, prescribing pains and penalties to meet acts of violation, 
and appointing supervisors, deputy marshals and constables, backed by troops, 
to execute its provisions? Yet the average black man in Boston measures 
about the distance from the average black man in Alabama, which would be 
measured, if we could make a diagram by the intellectual territory separating 
Mr. Frederick Douglass from Mrs. Stowe's ingenious young friend, Miss Topsy 
St. Clair, and while he cuts no figure in the population of Boston, he is in an 
actual majority in many parts of Alabama. 

If there be corruption in Southern elections, if there be a repression of the 
black vote, believe me, this is not the way to reach and reform it. Its only 
effect, if it can be made effectual, will be simply to transfer the corruption and 
its usufructs from one party to the other, leaving the real question as unsettled 
as ever. After all the excitement and turmoil incident to the unavoidable col- 
lision of races and the inevitable fomentation of sectional passion, we shall 
have to come back to where we now are. It is just as impossible to make a 
Southern negro a white man as it is to make a Northern white man a negro, 
though that is the miracle the Republican leaders are trying to work. 

Dear friends, why can't you put yourselves in our place, consider the dread- 
ful burden which this race problem imposes upon us, and, leaving the dead 
past to bury its dead, why don't you compel your politicians and your editors 
to treat us like fellow countrymen and fellow citizens, as we are, instead of 
treating us like rebels and traitors, which we are not? What interest is there 
of yours that we could harm, if we would, and what motive have we to set our- 
selves in opposition to any idea which you hold near to your business and 
bosoms ? 

I put it to you whether our Senators and Representatives in Congress, those 



THE RACE PROBLEM. 



331 



" Rebel Brigadiers " of whom you have heard so much, have lowered the 
standards of legislative integrity and public morality? If they have not,' but 
on the contrary they have raised them, is it not time that the right-thinking 
people of New England should stop and ask their conscience what right they 
have and what they are to gain by the attempt to apply to the South that which 
they would not submit to themselves? 

(An address before the Massachusetts Reform Club, September 26, 1890.) 







332 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Problem of the Black Man. 

By HENRY W. GRADY, of Georgia. 

(Born 1851, died 1889.) 




EVER, sir, has such a task been given to mortal stewardship. Never 
before in this Repubhc has the white race divided on the rights of 
an ahen race. The red man was cut down as a weed, because he 
hindered the way of the American citizen. The yellow man was 
shut out of this Republic because he is an alien and inferior. The 
red man was owner of the land — the yellow man highly civilized 
and assimilable — but they hindered both sections and are gone ! But the black 
man, affecting but one section, is clothed with every privilege of government 
and pinned to the soil, and my people commanded to make good at any hazard, 
and at any cost, his full and equal heirship of American privilege and prosperity. 
We do not shrink from this trial. It is so interwoven with our industrial fabric 
that we cannot disentangle it if we would — so bound up in our honorable 
obligation to the world, that we would not if we could. Can we solve it? The 
God who gave it into our hands, he alone can know. But this the weakest and 
wisest of us do know ; we cannot solve it with less than your tolerant and patient 
sympathy — with less than the knowledge that the blood that runs in your veins 
is our blood — and that, when we have done our best, whether the issue be lost 
or won, we shall feel your strong arms about us and hear the beating of your 
approving hearts ! 

The Temper of the South. 

"The resolute, clear-headed, broad-minded men of the South — the men 
whose genius made glorious every page of the first seventy years of American 
history — whose courage and fortitude you tested in five years of the fiercest 
war, whose energy has made bricks withovit straw and spread splendor amid 
the ashes of their war-wasted homes — these men wear this problem in their 
hearts and their brains, by day and by night. They realize, as you cannot, what 
this problem means. We need not go one step further unless you concede right 
here that the people I speak for are as honest, as sensible, and as just as your 
people, seeking as earnestly as you would in their place, to rightly solve the 




Henry W. Grady. 



334 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

problem that touches them at every vital point. If you insist that they are 
ruffians, blindly striving with bludgeon and shotgun to plunder and oppress a 
race, then I shall sacrifice my self-respect, and tax your patience in vain. But 
admit that they are men of common sense and common honesty — wisely 
modifying an environment they cannot wholly disregard — guiding and con- 
trolling as best they can the vicious and irresponsible of either race — compen- 
sating error with frankness, and retrieving in patience what they lose in pas- 
sion — • and conscious all the time that wrong means ruin — admit this, and we 
may reach an understanding to-night. 

" The President of the United States, in his late message to Congress, dis- 
cussing the plea that the South should be left to solve this problem, asks : 'Are 
they at work upon it? What solution do they offer? When will the black man 
cast a free ballot ? When will he have the civil rights that is his ? ' I shall not 
here protest against a partisanry that, for the first time in our history, in time 
of peace, has stamped with the great seal of our Government, a stigma upon 
the people of a great and loyal section ; though I gratefully remember that the 
great dead soldier who held the helm of State for the eight stormiest years of 
reconstruction, never found need for such a step ; and though there is no per- 
sonal sacrifice I would not make to remove this cruel and unjust imputation on 
my people from the archives of my country ! We give to the world this year a 
crop of seven million five hundred thousand bales of cotton, worth four hun- 
dred and fifty millions of dollars, and its cash equivalent in grain, grasses, and 
fruit. This enormous crop could not have come from the hands of sullen and 
discontented labor. It comes from peaceful fields, in which laughter and gossip 
rise above the hum of industry, and contentment runs with the singing plow. 
It is claimed that this ignorant labor is defrauded of its just hire. I present the 
tax-books of Georgia, which show that the negro, twenty-five years ago a slave, 
has in Georgia alone ten million dollars of assessed property, worth twice that 
much. Does not that record honor him, and vindicate his neighbors? What 
people, penniless, illiterate, has done so well ? For every Afro-American agitator, 
stirring the strife in which alone he prospers, I can show you a thousand negroes, 
happy in their cabin homes, tilling their own land by day, and at night taking 
from the lips of their children the helpful message their State sends them from 
the schoolhouse door. And the schoolhouse itself bears testimony. In Georgia, 
we added last year two hundred and fifty thousand dollars to the school fund, 
making a total of more than one million dollars — and this in the face of 
prejudice not yet conquered, of the fact that the whites are assessed for three 
hundred and sixty-eight million dollars, the blacks for ten million dollars, and 
yet forty-nine per cent, of the beneficiaries are black children — and in the 



THE PROBLEM OF THE BLACK MAN. 335 

doubt of many wise men if education helps, or can help, our problem. 
Charleston, with her taxable values cut half in two since i860, pays more in 
proportion for public schools than Boston. Although it is easier to give much 
out of much than little out of little, the South with one-seventh of the taxable 
property of the country, with relatively larger debt, having received only one- 
twelfth as much of public lands, and having back of its tax-books none of 
the half-billion of bonds that enrich the North — and though it pays 
annually twenty-six million dollars to your section as pensions — yet gives 
nearly one-sixth of the public school fund. 

Education. 

" The South, since '65, has spent one hundred and twenty-two million 
dollars in education, and this year is pledged to thirty-seven million dollars 
more for State and city schools, although the blacks paying one-thirtieth of 
the taxes get nearly one-half of the fund. Go into our fields and see whites 
and blacks working side by side. On our buildings in the same squad. In our 
shops at the same forge. Often the blacks crowd the white from work, for lower 
wages by their greater need or simpler habits, and yet are permitted, because 
we want to bar them from no avenue in which their feet are fatted to tread. 
They could not there be elected orators of white universities, as they have been 
here, but they do enter there, a hundred useful trades that are closed against 
them here. We hold it better and wiser to tend the weeds in the garden than 
to water the exotic in the window. In the South there are negro lawyers, teach- 
ers, editors, dentists, doctors, preachers, multiplying with the increasing ability 
of their race to support them. In villages and towns they have their military 
companies equipped from the armories of the State, their churches and societies 
built and supported largely by their neighbors. What is the testimony of the 
courts? In penal legislation we have steadily reduced felonies to misdemeanors, 
and have led the world in mitigating punishment for crime, that we might save, 
as far as possible, this dependent race from its own weakness. In our peni- 
tentiary record sixty per cent, of the prosecutors are negroes, and in every court 
the negro criminal strikes the colored juror, that white men may judge his 
case. In the North, one negro in every one hundred and eighty-five is in jail — 
in the South, only one in four hundred and forty-six. In the North, the per- 
centage of negro prisoners is six times as great as that of native whites — in the 
South, only four times as great. If prejudice wrongs him in Southern courts, 
the record shows it to be deeper in Northern courts. 

" Now, Mr. President, can it be seriously maintained that we are terroriz- 



336 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

ing the people from whose wilHng hands comes every year one bilhon dollars 
of farm crops? Or have robbed a people, who in twenty-five years from unre- 
warded slavery have amassed in one State twenty million dollars of property? 
Or that we intend to oppress the people we are arming every day? Or deceive 
them, when we are educating them to the utmost limit of our ability? Or 
outlaw them when we work side by side with them? " 

Alleged Intimidation. 

As to the charges of disorder, violence and intimidation, Mr. Grady said 
that every incident of the sort in the South was exaggerated and distorted for 
partisan effect. " When will the black cast a free ballot? " he asked. 

" When ignorance anywhere is not dominated by the will of the intelligent. 
When a laborer anywhere casts a vote unhindered by his boss. When the 
vote of the poor anywhere is not influenced by the power of the rich. When 
the strong and the steadfast do not everywhere control the suffrage of the weak 
and shiftless — then and not till then will the ballot of the negro be free. Let 
us see: Virginia cast in 1888 seventy-five per cent, of her vote. Massachusetts, 
the State in which I speak, sixty per cent, of her vote. Was it suppression in 
Virginia and natural causes in Massachusetts ? Last month Virginia cast sixty- 
nine per cent, of her vote, and Massachusetts, fighting in every district, cast 
only forty-nine per cent, of hers. If Virginia is condemned because thirty-one 
per cent, of her vote was silent, how shall this State escape in which fifty-one per 
cent, was dumb? Let us enlarge this comparison. The sixteen Southern States 
in '88 cast sixty-seven per cent, of their total vote — the six New England States 
but sixty-three per cent, of theirs. By what fair rule shall the stigma be put upon 
one section, while the other escapes? 

" What invites the negro to the ballot-box ? He knows that of all men, it 
has promised him most and yielded him least. His first appeal to suffrage was 
the promise of " forty acres and a mule." His second, the threat that Demo- 
cratic success meant his re-enslavement. Both have been proved false in his 
experience. He looked for a home, and he got the Freedman's Bank. He fought 
under promise of the loaf, and in victory was denied the crumbs. Discouraged 
and deceived, he has realized at last that his best friends are his neighbors with 
whom his lot is cast, and whose prosperity is bound up in his — and that he has 
gained nothing in politics to compensate the loss of their confidence and sym- 
pathy that is at least his best and his enduring hope. 

" You may pass force bills, but they will not avail. You may surrender your 
own liberties to Federal election law, you may submit, in fear of a necessity 



THE PROBLEM OF THE BLACK MAN. 337 

that does not exist, that the very form of this Government may be changed — 
this old State which holds in its charter the boast that it ' is a free and inde- 
pendent commonwealth ' may deliver its election machinery into the hands of 
the Government is helped to create — but never, sir, will a single State of this 
Union, North or South, be delivered again to the control of an ignorant and 
inferior race. If the negro had not been enfranchised, the South would have 
been divided and the Republic united. His enfranchisement — against which I 
enter no protests — holds the South united and compact. What solution then 
can we offer for the problem? Time alone can disclose it to us. We simply 
report progress and ask your patience. If the problem be solved at all — and I 
firmly believe it will, though nowhere else has it been — it will be solved by the 
people most deeply bound in interest, most deeply pledged in honor to its solu- 
tion. I had rather see my people render back this question rightly solved than 
to see them gather all the spoils over which faction has contended since Cataline 
conspired, and Cassar fought. Meantime we treat the negro fairly, measuring 
to him justice in the fullness the strong should give to the weak, and leading 
him in the steadfast ways of citizenship that he may no longer be the prey of 
the unscrupulous and the sport of the thoughtless. We open to him every 
pursuit in which he can prosper, and seek to broaden his training and capacity. 
" The love we feel for that race you cannot measure nor comprehend. As 
I attest it here, the spirit of my old black mammy, from her home up there, looks 
down to bless, and through the tumult of this night, steals the sweet music of 
her croonin^s as thirty years ago she held me in her black arms and led me 
smiling in to sleep. 

America's Mission. 

" I stand here, Mr. President, to profess no new loyalty. When General 
Lee, whose heart was the temple of our hopes and whose arm was clothed with 
our strength, renewed his allegiance to this Government at Appomattox, he 
spoke from a heart too great to be false, and he spoke for every honest man 
from Maryland to Texas. From that day to this, Hamilcar has nowhere in 
the South sworn young Hannibal to hatred and vengeance — but everywhere 
to loyalty and to love. Witness the veteran standing at the base of a Con- 
federate monument, above the graves of his comrades, his empty sleeve tossing 
in the April wind, adjuring the young men about him, to serve as earnest and 
loyal citizens the Government against which their fathers fought. This mes- 
sage, delivered from that sacred presence, has gone home to the hearts of my 
fellows ! And, sir, I declare here, if physical courage be always equal to human 
aspiration, that they would die, sir, if need be, to restore this Republic their 
fathers fought to dissolve! 



338 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

" Such, Mr. President, is this problem as we see it, such is the temper in 
which we approach it, such the progress made. What do we ask of you ? First, 
patience ; out of this alone can come perfect work. Second, confidence ; in this 
alone can you judge fairly. Third, sympathy; in this you can help us best. 
Fourth, give us your sons as hostages. When you plant your capital in millions, 
send your sons that they may know how true are our hearts and may help to 
swell the Anglo-Saxon current until it can carry without danger this black 
infusion. Fifth, loyalty to the Republic — for there is sectionalism in loyalty 
as in estrangement. This hour little needs the loyalty that is loyal to one section 
and yet holds the other in enduring suspicion and estrangement. 

" A mighty duty, sir, and a mighty inspiration impels every one of us to- 
night to lose in patriotic consecration whatever estranges, whatever divides. 
We, sir, are Americans — and we fight for human liberty ! The uplifting force 
of the American idea is under every throne on earth. France, Brazil — these 
are our victories. To redeem the earth from kingcraft and oppression — this 
is our mission ! And we shall not fail. God has sown in our soil the seed of 
his millennial harvest, and he will not lay the sickle to the ripening crop until 
his full and perfect day has come. Our history, sir, has been a constant and 
expanding miracle from Plymouth Rock and Jamestown all the way — aye, 
even from the hour when, from the voiceless and trackless ocean, a new world 
rose to the sight of the inspired sailor. As we approach the fourth centennial 
of that stupendous day — when the old world will come to marvel and to learn 
amid our gathered treasures — let us resolve to crown the miracles of our past, 
with the spectacle of a Republic compact, united, indissoluble in the bonds of 
love — loving from the Lakes to the Gulf — the wounds of war healed in every 
heart as on every hill — serene and resplendent at the summit of human achieve- 
ment and earthly glory — blazing out the path, and making clear the way up 
which all the nations of the earth must come in God's appointed time ! " 

(A speech delivered at the annual banquet of the Boston Merchants' Association, in Boston, December 
12, 1889.) 




THE NEW SOUTH. 339 



The New South. 



By HENRY W. GRADY, of Georgia. 

(Born 185 1, died 1889.) 

*HERE was a South of slavery and secession — that South is dead. 
There is a South of union and freedom — that South, thank God, is 
Hving, breathing, growing every hour." These words, deUvered 
from the immortal lips of Benjamin H. Hill, at Tammany Hall, in 
1866, true then, and truer now, I shall make my text to-night. 

Mr. President and Gentlemen : Let me express to you my 
appreciation of the kindness by which I am permitted to address you. I make 
this abrupt acknowledgment advisedly, for I feel that if, when I raised ray 
provincial voice in this ancient and august presence, I could find courage for no 
more than the opening sentence, it would be well if, in that sentence, I had met 
in a rough sense my obligation as a guest, and had perished, so to speak, with 
courtesy on my lips and grace in my heart. 

Permitted, through your kindness, to catch my second wind, let me say that 
I appreciate the significance of being the first Southerner to speak at this board, 
which bears the substance, if it surpasses the semblance of original New 
England hospitality, and honors a sentiment that in turn honors you, but in 
which my personality is lost and the compliment to my people made plain. 

I bespeak the utmost stretch of your courtesy to-night. I am not troubled 
about those from whom I come. You remember the man whose wife sent him 
to a neighbor with a pitcher of milk, and who, tripping on the top step, fell, with 
such casual interruptions as the landings afforded, into the basement ; and, 
while picking himself up, had the pleasure of hearing his wife call out : 

" John, did you break the pitcher ? " 

" No, I didn't," said John, " but I bedinged if I don't." 

So, while those who call to me from behind may inspire me with energy, 
if not with courage, I ask an indulgent hearing from you. I beg that you will 
bring your full faith in American fairness and frankness to judgment upon what 
I shall say. There was an old preacher once who told some boys of the Bible 
lesson he was going to read in the morning. The boys, finding the place, glued 
together the connecting pages. The next morning he read on the bottom of 



340 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

one page : " When Noah was one hundred and twenty years old he took unto 
himself a wife, who was " then turning the page " one hundred and forty cubits 
long, forty cubits wide, built of gopher wood, and covered with pitch inside and 
out." He was naturally puzzled at this. He read it again, verified it, and then 
said : " My friends, this is the first time I ever met this in the Bible, but I 
accept it as an evidence of the assertion that we are fearfvdly and wonderfully 
made." If I could get you to hold such faith to-night, I could proceed cheerfully 
to the task I otherwise approach with a sense of consecration. 

Pardon me one word, Mr. President, spoken for the sole purpose of getting 
into the volumes that go out annually freighted with the rich eloquence of your 
speakers — the fact that the Cavalier, as well as the Puritan, was on the continent 
in its early days, and that he was " up and able to be about." I have read your 
books carefully and I find no mention of that fact, which seems to me an 
important one for preserving a sort of historical equilibrum, if for nothing else. 

Let me remind you that the Virginia Cavalier first challenged France on 
this continent, that Cavalier John Smith gave New England its very name, and 
was so pleased with the job that he has been handing his own name around 
ever since, and that while Miles Standish was cutting off men's ears for courting 
a girl without her parents' consent, and forbade men to kiss their wives on 
Sunday, the Cavalier was courting everything in sight, and that the Almighty 
had vouchsafed great increase to the Cavalier colonies, the huts in the wilder- 
ness being as full as the nests in the woods. 

But having incorporated the Cavalier as a fact in your charming little 
book, I shall let him work out his own salvation, as he has always done with 
engaging gallantry, and we will hold no controversy as to his merits. Why 
should we? Neither Puritan nor Cavalier long survived as such. The virtues 
and traditions of both happily still live for the inspiration of their sons and the 
saving of the old fashion. Both Puritan and Cavalier were lost in the storm of 
the first Revolution, and the American citizen, supplanting both, and stronger 
than either, took possession of the Republic bought by their common blood 
and fashioned to wisdom, and charged himself with teaching men government 
and establishing the voice of the people as the voice of God. 

My friend. Dr. Talmage, has told you that the typical American has yet to 
come. Let me tell you that he has already come. Great types, like valuable 
plants, are slow to flower and fruit. But from the union of these colonist 
Puritans and Cavaliers, from the straightening of their purposes and the crossing 
of their blood, slow perfecting through a century, came he who stands as the 
first typical American, the first who comprehended within himself all the strength 
and gentleness, all the majesty and grace of this Republic — Abraham Lincoln. 



THE NEW SOUTH. 341 

He was the sum of Puritan and Cavalier; for in his ardent nature were fused 
the virtues of both, and in the depths of his great soul the faults of both were 
lest. He was greater than Puritan, greater than Cavalier, in that he was 
American, and that in his homely form were first gathered the vast and thrilling 
forces of his ideal government, charging it with such tremendous meaning, and 
so elevating it above human suffering, that martyrdom, though infamously 
aimed, came as a fitting crown to a life consecrated from the cradle to human 
liberty. Let us, each cherishing the traditions and honoring his fathers, build 
with reverent hands to the type of his simple but sublime life, in which all types 
are honored ; and in our common glory as Americans there will be plenty and 
some to spare for your forefathers and for mine. 

In speaking to the toast with which you have honored me, I accept the 
term, " The New South," as in no sense disparaging to the old. Dear to me, 
sir, is the home of my childhood and the traditions of my people. I would not, 
if I could, dim the glory they won in peace and war, or by word or deed take 
aught from the splendor and grace of their civilization, never equaled, and, per- 
haps, never to be equaled in its chivalric strength and grace. There is a New 
South, not through protest against the old, but because of new conditions, new 
adjustments, and, if you please, new ideas and aspirations. It is to this that I 
address myself, and to the consideration of which I hasten, lest it become the 
Old South before I get to it. Age does not endow all things with strength and 
virtue, nor are all new things to be despised. The shoemaker who put over his 
door, " John Smith's shop, founded in 1760," was more than matched by his 
young rival across the street who hung out this sign : " Bill Jones. Established 
1886. No old stock kept in this shop." 

Dr. Talmage has drawn for you, with a master hand, the picture of your re- 
turning armies. He has told you how, in the pomp and circumstance of war, 
they came back to you, marching with proud and victorious tread, reading their 
glory in a nation's eyes. Will you bear with me while I tell you of another 
army that sought its home at the close of the late war? An army that marched 
home in defeat and not in victory — in pathos and not in splendor, but in glory 
that equaled yours, and to hearts as loving as ever welcomed heroes home. Let 
me picture to you the foot-sore Confederate soldier, as, buttoning up in his 
faded gray jacket the parole which was to bear testimony to his children of his 
fidelity and faith, he turned his face southward from Appomattox in April, 
1865. Think of him as ragged, half-starved, heavy hearted, enfeebled by want 
and wounds ; having fought to exhaustion, he surrenders his gun, wrings the 
hands of his comrades in silence, and, lifting his tear-stained and pallid face for 
the last time to the graves that dot the old Virginia hills, pulls his gray cap 



342 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

over his brow and oegins the slow and painful journey. What does he find ? — 
let me ask you who went to your homes eager to find, in the welcome you had 
justly earned, full payment for four years' sacrifice — what does he find when, 
having followed the battle-stained cross against overwhelming odds, dreading 
death not half so much as surrender, he reaches the home he left so prosperous 
and beautiful ? He finds his house in ruins, his farm devastated, his slaves free, 
his stock killed, his barn empty, his trade destroyed, his money worthless; his 
social system, feudal in its magnificence, swept away; his people without law or 
legal status; his comrades slain, and the burdens of others heavy on his 
shoulders. Crushed by defeat, his very traditions gone; without money, credit, 
employment, material training; and besides all this, confronted with the gravest 
problem that ever met human intelligence — the establishing of a status for the 
vast body of liberated slaves. 

What does he do — this hero in gray with a heart of gold? Does he sit 
down in sullenness and despair? Not for a day. Surely God, who had stripped 
him of his prosperity, inspired him in his adversity. As ruin was never before 
so overwhelming, never was restoration swifter. The soldier stepped from the 
trenches into the furrow ; horses that had charged Federal guns marched before 
the plow, and fields that ran red with human blood in April were green with 
the harvest of June ; women reared in luxury cut up their dresses and made 
breeches for their husbands, and, with a patience and heroism that fit women 
always as a garment, gave their hands to work. There was little bitterness in 
all this. Cheerfulness and frankness prevailed. " Bill Arp " struck the key- 
note when he said : " Well, I killed as many of them as they did of me, and 
now I am going to work." Or the soldier returning home after defeat and 
roasting some corn on the roadside, who made the remark to his comrades : 
" You may leave the South if you want to, but I am going to Sandersville, kiss 
my wife and raise a crop, and if the Yankees fool with me any more I will whip 
'em again." I want to say of General Sherman — who is considered an able 
man in our parts, though some people think he is kind of careless about fire — 
that from the ashes he left us in 1864 we have raised a brave and beautiful city; 
that somehow or other we have caught the sunshine in the bricks and mortar 
of our homes, and have builded therein not one ignoble prejudice or memory. 

But in all this what have we accomplished ? What is the sum of our work ? 
We have found out that in the general summary the free negro counts more 
than he did as a slave. We have planted the schoolhouse on the hill top and 
made it free to white and black. We have sowed towns and cities in the place 
of theories, and put business above politics. We have challenged your spinners 
in Massachusetts and your iron makers in Pennsylvania. We have learned that 



THE NEW SOUTH. 343 

the four hundred million dollars annually received from our cotton crop will 
make us rich, when the supplies that make it are home-raised. We have reduced 
the commercial rate from twenty-four to four per cent., and are floating four per 
cent, bonds. We have learned that one Northern emigrant is worth fifty 
foreigners, and have smoothed the path to southward, wiped out the place where 
Mason and Dixon's line used to be, and hung our latchstring to you and yours. 

We have reached the point that marks perfect harmony in every household, 
when the husband confesses that the pies which his wife cooks are as good as 
those his mother used to bake; and we admit that the sun shines as brightly 
and the moon as softly as it did " before the war." We have established thrift in 
the city and country. We have fallen in love with work. We have restored 
comfort to homes from which culture and elegance never departed. We have let 
economy take root and spread among us as rank as the crab grass which sprung 
from Sherman's cavalry camps, until we are ready to lay odds on the Georgia 
Yankee, as he manufactures relics of the battlefield in a one-story shanty and 
squeezes pure olive oil out of his cotton seed, against any down-easter that ever 
swapped wooden nutmegs for flannel sausages in the valley of Vermont. 

Above all, we know that we have achieved in these " piping times of peace," 
a fuller independence for the South than that which our fathers sought to win 
in the forum by their eloquence, or compel on the field by their swords. 

It is a rare privilege, sir, to have had part, however humble, in this work. 
Never was nobler duty confided to human hands than the uplifting and upbuild- 
ing of the prostrate and bleeding South, misguided, perhaps, but beautiful in her 
suffering, and honest, brave, and generous always. In the record of her social, 
industrial, and political illustrations we await with confidence the verdict of the 
world. 

But what of the negro? Have we solved the problem he presents, or 
progressed in honor and equity toward the solution? Let the record speak to 
the point. No section shows a more prosperous laboring population than the 
negroes of the South ; none in fuller sympathy with the employing and land- 
owning class. He shares our school fund, has the fullest protection of our laws, 
and the friendship of our people. Self-interest, as well as honor, demand that 
they should have this. Our future, our very existence, depends upon our work- 
ing out this problem in full and exact justice. We understand that when Lincoln 
signed the Emancipation Proclamation, your victory was assured ; for he then 
committed you to the cause of human liberty, against which the arms of man 
cannot prevail ; while those of our statesmen who trusted to make slavery the 
corner stone of the Confederacy doomed us to defeat as far as they could, com- 
mitting us to a cause that reason could not defend or the sword maintain in the 



344 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

sight of advancing civilization. Had Mr. Toombs said, which he did not say, 
that he would call the roll of his slaves at the foot of Bunker Hill, he would have 
been foolish, for he might have known that whenever slavery became entangled 
in war it must perish, and that the chattel in human flesh ended forever in New 
England when your fathers — not to be blamed for parting with what did not 
pay — sold their slaves to our fathers, not to be praised for knowing a paying 
thing when they saw it. 

The relations of the Southern people with the negro are close and cordial. 
We remember with what fidelity for four years he guarded our defenseless 
women and children, whose husbands and fathers were fighting against his 
freedom. To his credit be it said that whenever he struck a blow for his own 
liberty he fought in open battle, and when at last he raised his black and humble 
hands that the shackles might be struck off, those hands were innocent of wrong 
against his helpless charges, and worthy to be taken in loving grasp by every 
man who honors loyalty and devotion. 

Ruffians have maltreated him, rascals have misled him, philanthropists es- 
tablished a bank for him, but the South with the North protest against injustice 
to this simple and sincere people. To liberty and enfranchisement is as far aj 
the law can carry the negro. The rest must be left to conscience and common 
sense. It should be left to those among whom his lot is cast, with whom he is 
indissolubly connected and whose prosperity depends upon their possessing his 
intelligent sympathy and confidence. Faith has been kept with him in spite 
of calumnious assertions to the contrary by those who assume to speak for us, 
or by frank opponents. Faith will be kept with him in future if the South holds 
li.er reason and integrity. 

But have we kept faith with you? In the fullest sense, yes. When Lee 
surrendered — I don't say when Johnson surrendered, because I understand he 
still alludes to the time when he met General Sherman last as the time when he 
" determined to abandon any further prosecution of the struggle" — when Lee 
surrendered, I say, and Johnson quit, the South became, and has been, loyal to 
the Union. We fought hard enough to know that we were whipped, and in 
perfect frankness accepted as final the arbitrament of the sword to which we 
had appealed. The South found her jewel in the toad's head of defeat. The 
shackles that had held her in narrow limitations fell forever when the shackles 
of the negro slave were broken. 

Under the old regime the negroes were slaves to the South, the South was 
a slave to the system. The old plantation, with its simple police regulation 
and its feudal habit, was the only type possible under slavery. Thus was gath- 
ered in the hands of a splendid and chivalric oligarchy the substance that should 



THE NEW SOUTH. 345 

have been diffused among the people, as the rich blood, under certain artificial 
conditions, is gathered at the heart, filling that with affluent rapture, but leav- 
ing the body chill and colorless. 

The old South rested everything on slavery and agriculture, unconscious 
that these could neither give nor maintain healthy growth. The new South 
presents a perfect democracy, the oligarchs leading in the popular movement — 
a social system compact and closely knitted, less splendid on the surface but 
stronger at the core ; a hundred farms for every plantation, fifty homes for every 
palace, and a diversified industry that meets the complex needs of this com- 
plex age. 

The new South is enamored of her new work. Her soul is stirred with 
the breath of a new life. The light of a grander day is falling fair on her face. 
She is thrilling with the consciousness of a growing power and prosperity. 
As she stands upright, full-statured and equal among the people of the earth, 
breathing the keen air and looking out upon the expanding horizon, she under- 
stands that her emancipation came because, in the inscrutable wisdom of God, 
her honest purpose was crossed and her brave armies were beaten. 

This is said in no spirit of time-serving or apology. The South has nothing 
for which to apologize. She believes that the late struggle between the States 
was war and not rebellion, revolution and not conspiracy, and that her con- 
victions were as honest as yours. I should be unjust to the dauntless spirit of 
the South and to my own convictions if I did not make this plain in this pres- 
ence. The South has nothing to take back. In my native town of Athens is a 
monument that crowns its central hills — a plain, white shaft. Deep cut into 
its shining side is a name dear to me above the names of men, that of a brave 
and simple man who died in brave and simple faith. Not for all the glories of 
New England — from Plymouth Rock all the way — would I exchange the 
heritage he left me in his soldier's death. To the feet of that shaft I shall send 
my children's children to reverence him who ennobled their name with his heroic 
blood. But, sir, speaking from the shadow of that memory, which I honor as 
I do nothing else on earth, I say that the cause in which he suffered and for 
which he gave his life was adjudged by higher and fuller wisdom than his or 
mine, and I am glad that the omniscient God held the balance of battle in his 
Almighty hand, and that human slavery was swept forever from American soil 
— the American Union saved from the wreck of war. 

This message, Mr. President, comes to you from consecrated ground. 
Every foot of the soil about the city in which I live is as sacred as a battle- 
ground of the Republic. Every hill that invests it is hallowed by the blood 
of your brothers who died for your victory, and doubly hallowed to us by the 



346 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

blood of those who died hopeless, but undaunted, in defeat — sacred soil to all 
of us, rich with memories that make us purer and stronger and better, silent but 
staunch witnesses in its red desolation of the matchless valor of American hearts 
and the deathless glory of American arms — speaking an eloquent witness in 
its white peace and prosperity to the indissoluble union of American States and 
the unperishable brotherhood of the American people. 

Now, what answer has New England to this message ? Will she permit the 
prejudice of war to remain in the hearts of the conquerors, when it has died in 
the hearts of the conquered? Will she transmit this prejudice to the next gen- 
e-ration, that in their hearts, which never felt the generous ardor of conflict, it 
may perpetuate itself? Will she withhold, save in strained courtesy, the hand 
which, straight from the soldier's heart, Grant ofifered to Lee at Appomattox? 
Will she make the vision of a restored and happy people, which gathered above 
the couch of your dying captain, filling his heart with grace, touching his lips 
with praise and glorifying his path to the grave ; will she make this vision on 
which the last sigh of his expiring soul breathed a benediction, a cheat and a 
delusion? If she does, the South, never abject in asking for comradeship, 
must accept with dignity its refusal ; but if she does not — if she accepts with 
frankness and sincerity this message of good-will and friendship, then will the 
prophecy of Webster, delivered in this very society forty years ago, amid tre- 
mendous applause, be verified in its fullest and final sense, when he said : 
" Standing hand to hand and clasping hands, we should remain united as we 
have been for sixty years, citizens of the same country, members of the same 
government, united, all united now and united forever." There have been dif- 
ficulties, contentions, and controversies, but I tell you that in my judgment 

" Those opposed eyes, 
Which like the meteors of a troubled heaven, 
All of one nature, of one substance bred, 
Did lately meet in th' intestine shock, 
Shall now in mutual well beseeming ranks 
March all one way." 

(Being the celebrated address before the New England Society at its annual banquet in New York on 
the night of December 22, 1886.) 




THE MAINE DEAD. 347 

The Maine Dead. 

By ROBERT Q. COUSINS, of Iowa. 



R. SPEAKER, whether this measure shall prevail, either in the form 
in which it has come from the committee or in the form as pro- 
posed in the amendment, it is both appropriate and just; but hardly 
is it mentionable in contemplation of the great calamity to which 
it appertains. It will be an incidental legislative footnote to a page 
of history that shall be open to the eyes of this Republic and of the 
world for all time to come. No human speech can add anything to the silent 
gratitude, the speechless reverence, already given by a great and grateful nation 
to its dead defenders, and to their living kin. No act of Congress providing 
for their needs can be a restitution for their sacrifice. Human nature does, in 
many ways, its best, and still feels deep in debt. 

Expressions of condolence have come from every country and from every 
clime, and every nerve of steel and ocean cable has carried on electric breath 
the sweetest and tenderest words of sympathy for that gallant crew who manned 
The Maine. But no human recompense can reach them. Humanity and time 
remain their everlasting debtors. 

It was a brave and strong and splendid crew. They were a part of the 
blood and bone and sinew of our land. Two of them were from my native 
State of Iowa. Some were only recently at the United States Naval Academy, 
where they had so often heard the morning and the evening salutation to the 
flag — that flag which had been interwoven with the dearest memories of their 
lives, that had colored all their friendships with the lasting blue of true fidelity. 
But whether they came from naval school or civil life, from one State or 
another, they called each other comrade — that gem of human language which 
sometimes means but a little less than love and a little more than friendship, 
that gentle salutation of the human heart which lives in all the languages of 
man, that winds and turns and runs through all the joys and sorrows of the 
human race, through deed and thought and dream, through song and toil and 
battlefield. 

No foe had ever challenged them. The world can never know how brave 
they were. They never knew defeat; they never shall. While at their posts 




Robert G. Cousins. 



THE MAINE DEAD. 



349 



of duty sleep lured them into the abyss ; then death unlocked their slumbering 
eyes but for an instant to behold its dreadful carnival, most of them just when 
life was full of hope and all its tides were at their highest, grandest flow ; just 
when the early sunbeams were falling on the steppes of fame and flooding all 
life's landscape far out into the dreamy, distant horizon ; just at that age when 
all the nymphs were making diadems and garlands, waving laurel wreaths 
before the eyes of young and eager nature — just then, when death seemed 
most unnatural. 

Hovering above the dark waters of that mysterious harbor of Havana, 
the black-winged vulture watches for the dead, while over it and over all there is 
the eagle's piercing eye sternly watching for the truth. 

Whether the appropriation carried by this resolution shall be ultimately 
charged to fate or to some foe shall soon appear. Meanwhile a .patient and a 
patriotic people, enlightened by the lessons of our history, remembering the 
woes of war, both to the vanquished and victorious, are ready for the truth 
and ready for their duty. 

" The tumult and the shouting dies — 
The captains and the kings depart — 
Still stands thine ancient sacrifice, 
An humble and a contrite heart. 
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet. 
Lest we forget — lest we forget." 

(A speech delivered in the House of Representatives, March 21, 1898.) 





350 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Philippines. 

By GEORGE F. HOAR, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1826.) 



STAND here to-day to plead with you not to abandon the principles 
that have brought these things to pass. I implore you to keep to the 
policy that has made the country great, that has made the Repub- 
lican party great, that has made the President great. I have nothing 
new to say. But I ask you to keep in the old channels, and to keep 
off the old rocks laid down in the old charts, and to follow the old 

sailing orders that all the old captains of other days have obeyed, to take your 

bearings, as of old, from the north star, 

Of whose true fixed and resting quality 
There is no fellow in the firmament, 

and not from this meteoric light of empire. 

Especially, if I could, would I persuade the great Republican party to 
come back again to its old faith, to its old religion, before it is too late. There 
is yet time. The President has said again and again that his is only an ad 
interim policy until Congress shall act. It is not yet too late. Congress has 
rejected, unwisely, as I think, some declarations of freedom. But the two 
houses have not as yet committed themselves to despotism. The old, safe 
path, the path alike of justice and of freedom, is still easy. It is a path familiar, 
of old, to the Republican party. If we have diverged from it for the first 
time, everything in our history, everj^thing in our own nature calls us back. 
The great preacher of the English church tells you how easy is the return of 
a great and noble nature from the first departure from rectitude : 

" For so a taper, when its crown of flame is newly blown oflf, retains a 
nature so symbolical to light, that it will with greediness re-enkindle and snatch 
a ray from the neighbor fire." 

I for one believed and still believe that the pathway to prosperity and glory 
for the country was also the pathway to success and glory for the Republican 




George F. Hoar. 



352 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

party. I thought the two things inseparable. If, when we made the treaty 
of peace, we had adhered to the purpose we declared when we declared war ; 
if we had dealt with the Philippine Islands as we promised to deal, have dealt, 
and expect to deal with Cuba, the country would have escaped the loss of six 
thousand brave soldiers, other thousands of wrecked and shattered lives, the 
sickness of many more, the expenditure of hundreds of millions, and, what is 
far worse than all, the trampling under foot of its cherished ideals. There 
would have been to-day a noble republic in the East, sitting docile at our feet, 
receiving from us civilization, laws, manners, and giving in turn everything the 
gratitude of a free people could give — love, obedience, trade. The Philip- 
pine youth would throng our universities ; our Constitution, our Declaration, 
the lives of Washington and Lincoln, the sayings of Jefferson and Franklin 
would have been the text-books of their schools. How our orators and poets 
would have delighted to contrast America liberating and raising up the repub- 
lic of Asia, with England subduing and trampling under foot the republic of 
Africa. Nothing at home could have withstood the great party and the great 
President who had done these things. We should have come from the next 
election with a solid North and have carried half .the South. You would at 
least have been spared the spectacle of great Republican States rising in revolt 
against Republican policies. * * * 

I believe, Mr. President, not only that perseverance in this policy will be 
the abandonment of the principles upon which our Government is founded, 
that it will change our Republic into an empire, that our methods of legisla- 
tion, of diplomacy, of administration must hereafter be those which belong to 
empires, and not those which belong to republics; but I believe persistence in 
this attempt will result in the defeat and overthrow of the Republican party. 
That defeat may not come this year, or next year. I pray God it may never 
come. I well remember when the old Whig party, in the flush of delirium 
and anticipated triumph, gave up the great doctrines which it had so often 
avowed, and undertook to abandon the great territory between the Mississippi 
and the Pacific to its fate. It held its convention at Philadelphia. It selected 
as its candidate a great military chieftain. Amid the tempest and delirium a 
quiet delegate from my own State arose and declared to the convention that 
the Whig party was dead. It seemed that a more audacious, a more foolish, 
a more astounding utterance never fell upon human ears. And what was the 
result? The party carried the country and elected its President. And within 
less than four years thereafter Daniel Webster, as he lay dying at Marshfield, 
said, " The Whig party as a political organization is gone ; and it is well." 



PHILIPPINES. 353 

Let no such fate attend the RepubHcan party. In my judgment, if not now, 
it will retrace its steps in time. 

The practical question which divided the American people last year, and 
which divides them to-day, is this : Whether in protecting the people of the 
Philippine Islands from the ambition and cupidity of other nations, we are 
bound to protect them from our own. 

Edward Everett concludes that masterpiece of consummate oratory, his 
address on the character of Washington : 

" Let us make a national festival and holiday of his birthday ; and ever 
as the 22d of February returns let us remember that while with these solemn and 
joyous rites of observance we celebrate the great anniversary, our fellow citi- 
zens on the Hudson, on the Potomac, from the Southern plains to the Western 
lakes, are engaged in the same ofiQces of gratitude and love. Nor we, nor 
they alone. Beyond the Ohio, beyond the Mississippi, along that stupendous 
trail of immigration from the East to the West, which bursting into States as 
it moves westward, is already threading the Western prairies, swarming through 
the portals of the Rocky mountains and winding down their slopes, the name 
and the memory of Washington on that gracious night will travel with the 
silver queen of heaven through sixty degrees of longitude, nor part company 
with her till she walks in her brightness through the Golden Gate of California 
and passes serenely on to hold midnight court with her Australian stars. 
There and there only, in barbarous archipelagos, as yet untrodden by civilized 
man, the name of Washington is unknown ; and there, too, when they swarm 
with enlightened millions, new honors shall be paid with ours to his memory." 

The time which the orator predicted came. In that Eastern archipelago, 
no longer the home of barbarism, a people had achieved their independence 
and thrown o& the yoke of centuries. They were longing for civilization, edu- 
cation, and liberty. To the millions with which that land is swarming, in 
the dawning of a new light the name of Washington has become familiar. 
But, alas, the people are citing his example to protect their own liberties 
against his countrymen. They are nearly threefold in number the people to 
whom his Farewell Address was delivered. Pray to God that that revered 
and beautiful character, our shield so often against distempered folly and unhal- 
lowed ambition, may be theirs also. 

In dealing with this question, Mr. President, I do not mean to enter upon 
any doubtful ground. I shall advance no proposition ever seriously disputed 
in this country till within twelve months. I shall cite no authority that is not 
by the common consent of all parties and all men of all shades of opinion 
recognized as among the very weightiest in jurisprudence and in the conduct 



354 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

of the State. I shall claim nothing as fact which is not abundantly proven 
by the evidence of the great commanders who conducted this war ; by evi- 
dence coming from the President and the heads of departments, or persons 
for whose absolute trustworthiness these authorities vouch. 

If to think as I do in regard to the interpretation of the Constitution ; in 
regard to the mandates of the moral law or the law of nations, to which all 
men and all nations must render obedience; in regard to the policies which 
are wisest for the conduct of the State, or in regard to those facts of recent 
history in the light of which we have acted or are to act hereafter, be treason, 
then Washington was a traitor; then Jefferson was a traitor; then Jackson was 
a traitor; then Franklin was a traitor; then Sumner was a traitor; then Lincoln 
was a traitor; then Webster was a traitor; then Clay was a traitor; then Cor- 
win was a traitor ; then Kent was a traitor ; then Seward was a traitor ; then 
McKinley, within two years, was a traitor; then the Supreme Court of the 
United States has been in the past a nest and hotbed of treason ; then the people 
of the United States, for more than a century, have been traitors to their own 
flag and their own Constitution. 

We are presented with an issue that can be clearly and sharply stated as a 
question of constitutional power, a question of international law, a question of 
justice and righteousness, or a question of public expediency. This can be 
stated clearly and sharply in the abstract, and it can be put clearly and sharply 
by an illustration growing out of existing facts. 

The constitutional question is : Has Congress the power, under our Con- 
stitution, to hold in subjection unwilling vassal States? 

The question of international law is : Can any nation rightfully convey 
to another sovereignty over an unwilling people who have thrown off its domin- 
ion, asserted their independence, established a government of their own, over 
whom it has at the time no practical control, from whose territory it has been 
disseized, and which it is beyond its power to deliver? 

The question of justice and righteousness is : Have we the right to crush 
and hold under our feet an unwilling and subj'ect people whom we have treated 
as allies, whose independence we are bound in good faith to respect, who had 
established their own free government, and who had trusted us? 

The question of public expediency is : Is it for our advantage to promote 
our trade at the cannon's mouth and at the point of the bayonet? 

All these questions can be put in a way of practical illustration by inquir- 
ing whether we ought to do what we have done, are doing, and mean to do 
in the case of Cuba; or what we have done, are doing, and some of you mean 
to do in the case of the Philippine Islands? * * * 

(From a speech delivered in tlie United States Senate, April 17, 1900.) 




THE PHILIPPINES. 355 



The Philippines. 

By HENRY CABOT LODGE, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1850.) 



HE questions involved in the future management of these islands, and in 
our policy in the far East, are of a nature to demand the highest and 
the most sagacious statesmanship. I have always thought with Webster 
that party politics should cease " at the water's edge." He spoke only 
in reference to our relations with foreign nations, but I think we might 
well apply his patriotic principle to our dealings with our own insular 
possessions, both in the Atlantic and the Pacific. The Philippines should be an 
American question, not the sport of parties or the subject of party creeds. The 
responsibility for them rests upon the American people, not upon the Demo- 
cratic or Republican party. If we fail in dealing with them, we shall all alike 
suffer from the failure, and if we succeed, the honor and the profit will redound 
in the end to the glory and the benefit of all. This view no doubt seems vision- 
ary. It certainly ought not to be so, and in time I believe it will be accepted. 
Unfortunately it is not the case to-day. 

One of the great political parties of the country has seen fit to make what 
is called " an issue " of the Philippines. They have no alternative policy to pro- 
pose, which does not fall to pieces as soon as it is stated. A large and important 
part of their membership, North and South, is heartily in favor of expansion, be- 
cause they are Americans, and have not only patriotism, but an intelligent per- 
ception of their own interests. They are the traditional party of expansion, the 
party which first went beyond seas and tried to annex Hawaii, which plotted 
for years to annex Cuba, which have in our past acquisitions of territory their 
one great and enduring monument. In their new wanderings they hav^e de- 
veloped a highly commendable, if somewhat hysterical, tenderness for the rights 
of men with dark skins dwelling in the islands of the Pacific, in pleasing con- 
trast to the harsh indifference which they have always manifested toward those 
American citizens who " wear the shadowed livery of the burnished sun " within 
the boundaries of the United States. The Democratic party has for years been 
the advocate of free trade and increased exports, but now they shudder at our 



356 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

gaining control of the Pacific and developing our commerce with the East. 
Ready in their opposition to protection, to open our markets to the free com- 
petition of all the tropical, all the cheapest labor of the world, they are now filled 
with horror at the thought of admitting to our markets that small fragment of 
the world's cheap labor contained in the Philippine Islands, something which 
neither Republicans nor any one else think for one moment of doing. Heed- 
less of their past and of their best traditions, careless of their inconsistencies, 
utterly regardless of the obvious commercial interests of the South, which they 
control ; totally indifferent to the wishes and beliefs of a large portion of their 
membership, and to the advice and example of some of their most patriotic, 
most loyal, and most courageous leaders, to whom all honor is due, the managers 
of the Democratic organization have decided to oppose the retention of the 
Philippines and our policy of trade expansion in the East, for which those islands 
supply the corner stone. Their reason appears to be the highly sagacious one 
that it is always wise to oppose whatever Republicans advocate, without regard 
to the merits of the policy or to the circumstances which gave it birth. I will 
make no comment upon this theory of political action, except to say that it has 
seemed for a long time exceedingly congenial to the intelligence of the Demo- 
cratic party, and that it may perhaps account for the fact that since i860, they 
have only held for eight years a brief and ineffective power. As an American 
I regret that our opponents should insist on making a party question of this 
new and far-reaching problem, so fraught with great promise of good, both to 
ourselves and to others. As a party man, and as a Republican I can only rejoice. 
Once more our opponents insist that we shall be the only political party devoted 
to American policies. As the standard of expansion once so strongly held by 
their great predecessors drops from their nerveless hands we take it up, and 
invite the American people to march with it. We offer our policy to the Ameri- 
can people, to Democrats and to Republicans, as an American policy, alike in 
duty and honor, in morals and in interest, as one not of skepticism and doubt, 
but of hope and faith in ourselves and in the future, as becomes a great young 
nation, which has not yet learned to use the art of retreat or to speak with the 
accents of despair. In 1804 the party which opposed expansion went down in 
utter wreck before the man who, interpreting aright the instincts, the hopes, and 
the spirit of the American people, made the Louisiana purchase. We make the 
same appeal in behalf of our American policies. We have made the appeal be- 
fore, and won, as we deserved to win. We shall not fail now. 

Before explaining our policy I shall be glad, as a preliminary, to state the 
policy proposed by our opponents, so that I could contrast our own with it, but 




Henry Cabot Lodge. 



358 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

I have thus far been unable to discover what their poHcy is. No doubt it exists, 
no doubt it is beautiful, but, like many beautiful things, it seems to the average 
searcher after truth both diaphanous and elusive. We have had presented to us, 
it is true, the policy desired by Aguinaldo and his followers, that we should 
acknowledge him as a government, enforce his rule upon the other eighty-three 
tribes, and upon all the other islands, and then protect him from foreign inter- 
ference. This plan, which would involve us in endless wars with the natives 
and keep us embroiled with other nations, loads us with responsibility without 
power and falls into ruin and absurdity the moment it is stated. Another proposi- 
tion is that we should treat the Philippines as we treat Cviba. That is precisely 
what we are doing. But what is really meant by this demand is not that we 
should treat the Philippines as we treat Cuba, but that we should make to them 
a promise as to the future. And that is what every proposition made by those 
opposed to the Republican party comes down to, a promise as to the future. 
We are to put down insurrection and disorder, and hold the islands temporarily 
without the consent of the governed, but simultaneously we are to make large 
promises as to the future which will look well in print, and keep insurrection and 
disorder alive. 

The resolutions offered by Senators on the other side, and the tenor of their 
speeches are of all this description. They present no policy, but invite us to 
make promises. Promises are neither action nor policy, and, in the form of 
legislation, are a grave mistake. Those which involve us in pledges of inde- 
pendence have the additional disadvantage of being the one sure means of keep- 
ing alive war and disorder in the islands. Those who ofifer them or urge them 
proceed on the assumption that you can deal with an Asiatic in the same manner 
and expect from him the same results as from a European or an American. 
This shows, it seems to me, a fatal misconception. The Asiatic mind and habit 
of thought are utterly different from ours. Words or acts which to us would 
show generosity and kindness, and would bring peace and order, to an Asiatic 
mean simply weakness and timidity and are to him an incentive to riot, resist- 
ance, and bloodshed. Promises of this kind, therefore, are neither effective 
action nor intelligent policy, but the sure breeders of war. If we must abandon 
the Philippines, let us abandon them frankly. If we mean to turn them over to 
domestic anarchy or foreign control, let us do it squarely. If we are to retain 
them, let us deal manfully with the problems as they arise. But do not indulge 
in the unspeakable cruelty of making promises, which our successors may be 
imable or unwilling to fulfill, and which will serve merely to light the flames of 
war once more, and bring death to hundreds of natives and to scores of Ameri- 
can soldiers. Let us not attempt in such a situation, and with such responsibili- 



THE PHILIPPINES. 359 

ties to mortgage an unknown future and give bonds to fate which will be 
redeemed in blood. 

The policy we offer, on the other hand, is simple and straightforward. We 
believe in the frank acceptance of existing facts, and in dealing with them as 
they are and not on a theory of what they might or ought to be. We accept 
the fact that the Philippine Islands are ours to-day, and that we are responsible 
for them before the world. The next fact is that there is a war in thoSe islands, 
which, with its chief in hiding, and no semblance of a government, has now 
degenerated into mere guerilla fighting and brigandage, with a precarious 
existence predicated on the November elections. Our immediate duty, there- 
fore, is to suppress this disorder, put an end to fighting, and restore peace and 
order. That is what we are doing. That is all we are called upon to do in 
order to meet the demands of the living present. Beyond this we ought not to 
go by a legislative act, except to make such provision that there may be no 
delay, in re-establishing civil government when the war ends. The question of 
our constitutional right and power to govern those islands in any way we please 
I shall not discuss. Not only is it still in the future, but if authority is lacking, 
the Constitution gives full right and authority to hold and govern the Philippines 
without making them either economically or politically part of our system, 
neither of which they should ever be. When our great Chief Justice, John Mar- 
shall — ''magnum et vcncrahile nomcn " — declared in the Cherokee case that the 
United States could have under its control, exercised by treaty or the laws of 
Congress, a " domestic and dependent nation," I think he solved the question 
of our constitutional relations to the Philippines. Further than the acts and 
the policy, which I have just stated, I can only give my own opinion and belief 
as to the future, and as to the course to be pursued in the Philippines. I hope 
and believe that we shall retain the islands, and that, peace and order once 
restored, we shall and should re-establish civil government, beginning with the 
towns and villages, where the inhabitants are able to manage their own affairs. 
We should give them honest administration, and prompt and efficient courts. 
We should see to it there is entire protection to persons and property, in order 
to encourage the development of the islands by the assurance of safety to in- 
vestors of capital. All men should be protected in the free exercise of their 
religion, and the doors thrown open to missionaries of all Christian sects. The 
land, which belongs to the people, and of which they have been robbed in the 
past, should be returned to them and their titles made secure. We should 
inaugurate and carry forward, in the most earnest and liberal way, a compre- 
hensive system of popular education. Finally, while we bring prosperity to the 
islands by developing their resources, we should, as rapidly as conditions will 



36o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

permit, bestow upon them self-government and home rule. Such, in outline, 
is the policy which I believe can be and will be pursued toward the Philippines. 
It will require time, patience, honesty, and ability for its completion, but it is 
thoroughly practicable and reasonable. 

The foundation of it all is the retention of the islands by the United States, 
and it is to that question that I desire to address myself. I shall not argue our 
title to the islands by the law of nations, for it is perfect. No other nation has 
ever questioned it. It is too plain a proposition to warrant the waste of time and 
v/ords upon it. Equally plain is our right under the Constitution, by a treaty 
which is the supreme law of the land, to hold those islands. I will not argue 
this point nor the entire legality of all that the President has done in accordance 
with his constitutional power and with the law passed by Congress at the last 
session which recognized the necessity of an increased army in order to cope 
with the existing insurrection. The opposition rests its weight on grounds 
widely different from these. They assert that on moral grounds we have no 
right to take or retain the Philippines, and that as a matter of expediency our 
whole Eastern policy was a costly mistake. I traverse both assertions. I deny 
both propositions. I believe we are in the Philippines as righteously as we are 
there rightfully and legally. I believe that to abandon the islands, or to leave 
them now, would be a wrong to humanity, a dereliction of duty, a base betrayal 
of the Filipinos who have supported us, led by the best men of Luzon, and in 
the highest degree contrary to sound morals. As to expediency, the arguments 
in favor of the retention of the Philippines seem to me so overwhelming that I 
should regard their loss as a calamity to our trade and commerce, and to all 
our business interests so great that no man can measure it. 

(Being part of a speech delivered in the House of Representatives, March 7, 1900.) 





THE STAINLESS SHIELD. 361 



The Stainless Shield. 

By JAMES A. GARFIELD, of Ohio. 

(Born 1831, died 1881.) 



R. CHAIRMAN : I have witnessed the extraordinary scenes of this 
convention with deep soHcitude. No emotion touches my heart 
more quickly than a sentiment in honor of a great and noble char- 
acter. But, as I sat on these seats and witnessed these demonstra- 
tions, it seemed to me you were a human ocean in a tempest. I 
have seen the sea lashed into a fury and tossed into a spray, and 
its grandeur moves the soul of the dullest man. But I remember that it is 
not the billows, but the calm level of the sea from which all heights and depths 
are measured. When the storm has passed, and the hour of calm settles on 
the ocean, when sunlight bathes its smooth service, then the astronomer and 
surveyor takes the level from which he measures all terrestrial heights and 
depths. Gentlemen of the convention, your present temper may not mark the 
healthful pulse of our people. When our enthusiasm has passed, when the 
emotions of this hour have subsided, we shall find the calm level of public opin- 
ion below the storm from which the thoughts of a mighty people are to be 
measured, and by which their final action will be determined. Not here in 
this brilliant circle, where fifteen thousand men and women are assembled, is 
the destiny of the Republic to be decreed ; not here, where I see the enthusiastic 
faces of seven hundred and fifty-six delegates, waiting to cast their votes into 
the urn and determine the choice of their party ; but by four million Republican 
firesides, where the thoughtful fathers, with wives and children about them, 
with calm thoughts inspired by love of home and love of country, with the 
history of the past, the hopes of the future, and the knowledge of the great 
m.en who have adorned and blessed our nation in days gone by, — there God 
prepares the verdict that shall determine the wisdom of our work to-night. 
Not in Chicago, in the heat of June, but in the sober quiet that comes between 
now and November, in the silence of deliberate judgment, will this great ques- 
tion be settled. Let us aid them to-night. But now, gentlemen of the con- 
vention. What do we want? (A voice, " Garfield.") Bear with me a moment. 
Hear me for this cause, and for a moment be silent that you may hear. Twen- 



Z(>2 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

ty-five years ago this Republic was wearing a triple chain of bondage. Long 
familiarity with the traffic in the body and souls of men had paralyzed the con- 
sciences of a majority of our people. The baleful doctrine of State sovereignty 
had shocked and weakened the noblest and most beneficent forms of the 
National Government, and the grasping power of slavery was seizing the virgin 
territories of the West, and dragging them into the den of eternal bondage. 
At that crisis the Republican party was born. It drew its first inspiration from 
the fire of liberty which God has planted in every man's heart, and which all 
the powers of ignorance and tyranny can never wholly extingutsh. The Repub- 
lican party came to deliver and save the Republic. It entered the arena when 
beleaguered and assailed territories were struggling for freedom, and drew 
around them the sacred circle of liberty, which the demon of slavery has never 
dared to cross. It made them free • forever. 

Strengthened by its victory on the frontier, that young party, under the 
leadership of that great man, who on this spot twenty years ago was made its 
leader, entered the national Capitol and assumed the high duties of the Gov- 
ernment. The light which shone from its banner dispelled the darkness in 
which slavery had enshrouded the Capitol, and melted the shackles of every 
slave, and consumed in the fire of liberty every slave pen within the shadow 
of the Capitol. Our national industries, by an impoverishing policy, were them- 
selves prostrated, and the streams of revenue flowed in such feeble currents 
that the treasury itself was well-nigh empty. The money of the people was 
the wretched notes of two thousand uncontrolled and irresponsible State bank 
corporations, which were filling the country with a circulation that poisoned, 
rather than sustained the life of business. 

The Republican party changed all this. It abolished the babel of con- 
fusion, and gave the country a currency as national as its flag, based upon 
the sacred faith of the people. It threw its protecting arm around our great 
industries, and they stood erect as with new life. It filled with the spirit of 
true nationality all the great functions of the Government. It confronted a 
rebellion of unexampled magnitude, with a slavery Ijehind it, and, under God, 
fought the final battle of liberty until victory was won. Then, after the storms 
of battle, were heard the sweet, calm words of peace uttered by the conquer- 
ing nation, and saying to the conquered foe that lay prostrate at its feet, " This 
is our only revenge, that you join us in lifting to the serene firmament of the 
Constitution, to shine like stars forever and ever, the immortal principles of 
truth and justice, that all men, white or black, shall be free and stand equal 
before the law." Then came the questions of reconstruction, the public debt, 
and the public faith. In the settlement of these questions the Republican party 



THE STAINLESS SHIELD. 363 

has completed its twenty-five years of glorious existence, and it has sent us 
here to prepare it for another lustrum of duty and of victory. How shall we 
do this great work? We cannot do it, my friends, by assailing our Republican 
brethren. God forbid that I should say one word to cast a shadow upon any 
name on the roll of our heroes. This coming fight is our Thermopyliie. We 
are standing upon a narrow isthmus. If our Spartan hosts are united, we can 
stand all the Persians that the Xerxes of Democracy can bring against us. Let 
us hold our ground for this one year, for the stars in their courses fight for us 
in the future. The census to be taken this year will bring reinforcements and 
continued power. But, in order to win the victory now, we want the vote of 
every Republican, of every Grant Republican in America, of every Blaine man 
and every anti-Blaine man. The vote of every follower of every candidate is 
needed, is needed to make our success certain ; therefore, I say, gentlemen 
and brethren, we are here to take calm counsel together, and inquire what we 
shall do. (A voice, " Nominate Garfield." Great applause.) 

We want a man whose life and opinions embody all the achievements of 
which I have spoken. We want a man who, standing on a mountain height, 
sees all the achievements of our past history, and carries in his heart the mem- 
ory of all its glorious deeds, and who, looking forward, prepares to meet the 
labor and the dangers to come. We want one who will act in no spirit of 
unkindness toward those we lately met in battle. The Republican party offers 
to our brethren of the South the olive branch of peace, and wishes them to 
return to brotherhood, on this supreme condition, that it shall be admitted, 
forever and forever, that, in the war for the Union, we were right and they 
were wrong. On that supreme condition, we meet them as brethren, and on 
no other. We ask them to share with us the blessings and honors of this great 
Republic. 

Now, gentlemen, not to weary you, I am about to present a name for your 
consideration — the name of a man who was the comrade and associate and 
friend of nearly all those noble dead, whose faces look down upon us from 
these walls to-night ; a man who began his career of public service twenty-five 
years ago, whose first duty was courageously done in the days of peril on the 
plains of Kansas, when the first red drops of that bloody shower began to fall, 
which finally swelled into the deluge of war. He bravely stood by young Kan- 
sas then, and, returning to his duty in the National Legislature, through all 
subsequent time, his pathway has been marked by labors performed in every 
department of legislation. You ask for his monuments. I point you to 
twenty-five years of national statutes. Not one great beneficent statute has 
been placed in our statute-books without his intelligent and powerful aid. He 



364 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



aided these men to formulate the laws that raised our great armies, and car- 
ried us through the war. His hand was seen in the workmanship of those 
statutes that restored and brought back the unity and married calm of the 
States. His hand was in all that great legislation that created the war cur- 
rency, and in a still greater work, that redeemed the promises of the Govern- 
ment, and made the currency equal to gold. And, when at last called from 
the halls of legislation into a high executive office, he displayed that experience, 
firmness, and poise of character which has carried us through a stormy period 
of three years. With one-half the public press crying " crucify him," and a 
hostile Congress seeking to prevent success, in all this he remained unmoved 
until victory crowned him. The great fiscal aflfairs of the nation, and the great 
business interests of the country, he has guarded and preserved, while execut- 
ing the law of resumption, and effecting its object without a jar, and agaiast 
the false prophecies of one-half of the press and all the Democracy of this con- 
tinent. He has shown himself able to meet with calmness the great emergen- 
cies of the Government for twenty-five years. He has trodden the perilous 
heights of public duty, and against all the shafts of malice has borne his breast 
unharmed. He has stood in the blaze of " that fierce light that beats against 
the throne," but its fiercest ray has found no flaw in his armor, no blot on his 
shield. I do not present him as a better Republican, or as a better man than 
thousands of others we honor, but I present him for your deliberate consider- 
ation. I nominate John Sherman, of Ohio. 

(Delivered in the Republican Convention at Chicago, in June, 1880, nominating John Sherman.) 




THE APPLE TREE SPEECH. 365 



The Apple Tree Speech. 

By ROSCOE CONKLING, of New York. 

(Born 1829, died 1888.) 

" When asked what State he hails from, 
Our sole reply shall be, 
He comes from Appomattox, 
And its famous apple tree." 

N obedience to instructions I should never dare to disregard — express- 
ing, also, my own firm convictions — I rise to propose a nomination 
with which the country and the Republican party can gladly win. The 
election before us is to be the Austerlitz of American poHtics. It will 
decide, for many years, whether the country shall be Republican or 
Cossack. The supreme need of the hour is not a candidate who can 
carry Michigan. All Republican candidates can do that. The need is not of a 
candidate who is popular in the Territories, because they have no vote. The 
need is of a candidate who can carry doubtful States. Not the doubtful States 
of the North alone, but doubtful States of the South, which we have heard, if 
I understand it aright, ought to take little or no part here, because the South 
has nothing to give, but everything to receive. No, gentlemen, the need that 
presses upon the conscience of this convention is a candidate who can carry 
doubtful States both North and South. And believing that he, more surely 
than any other man, can carry New York against any opponent, and can carry 
not only the North, but several States of the South, New York is for Ulysses S. 
Grant. Never defeated in peace or in war, his name is the most illustrious 
borne by living man. 

His services attest his greatness, and the country — nay, the world — knows 
them by heart. His fame was earned not alone in things written and said, but 
by the arduous greatness of things done. And perils and emergencies will 
search in vain in the future, as they have searched in vain in the past, for any 
other on whom the nation leans with such confidence and trust. Never having 
had a policy to enforce against the will of the people, he never betrayed a cause 
or a friend, and the people will never desert or betray him. Standing on the 




366 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

highest eminence of human distinction, modest, firm, simple, and self-poised, 
having filled all lands with his renown, he has seen not only the high-born and 
the titles, but the poor and the lowly in the uttermost ends of the earth, rise 
and uncover before him. He has studied the needs and the defects of many 
systems of government, and he has returned a better American than ever, with 
a wealth of knowledge and experience added to the hard common sense which 
shone so conspicuously in all the fierce light that beat upon him during sixteen 
years, the most trying, the most portentous, the most perilous in the nation's 
history. 

Vilified and reviled, ruthlessly aspersed by unnumbered presses, not in other 
lands, but in his own, assaults upon him have seasoned and strengthened his hold 
on the public heart. Calumny's ammunition has all been exploded; the powder 
has all been burned once; its force is spent; and the name of Grant will glitter 
a bright and imperishable star in the diadem of the Republic when those who 
have tried to tarnish that name have moldered in forgotten graves, and when 
their memories and their epitaphs have vanished utterly. 

Never elated by success, never depressed by adversity, he has ever, in peace 
as in war, shown the genius of common sense. The terms he prescribed for 
Lee's surrender foreshadowed the wisest prophecies and principles of true recon- 
struction. Victor in the greatest war of modern times, he quickly signalized his 
aversion to war and his love of peace by an arbitration of internal disputes, 
which stands as the wisest, the most majestic example of its kind in the world's 
diplomacy. When inflation, at the height of its popularity and frenzy, had swept 
both Houses of Congress, it was the veto of Grant, which, single and alone, over- 
threw expansion and cleared the way for specie resumption. To him, immeas- 
urably more than to any other man, is due the fact that every paper dollar is at 
last as good as gold. 

With him as our leader we shall have no defensive campaign. No ! We 
shall have nothing to explain away. We shall have no apologies to make. The 
shafts and the arrows have all been aimed at him, and they lie broken and harm- 
less at his feet. 

Life, liberty, and property will find a safeguard in him. When he said of the 
colored men in Florida, " Wherever I am, they may come also " — when he so 
said, he meant that, had he the power, the poor dwellers in the cabins of the 
South should no longer be driven in terror from the homes of their childhood 
and the graves of their murdered dead. When he refused to see Dennis Kearney 
in California, he meant that communism, lawlessness, and disorder, although it 
might stalk high-headed and dictate law to a whole city, would always find a foe 



THE APPLE TREE SPEECH. 367 

in him. He meant that, popular or unpopular, he would hew to the line of right, 
let the chips fly where they may. 

His integrity, his common sense, his courage, his unequaled experience, are 
the qualities offered to his country. The only argument, the only one that the 
wit of man or the stress of politics has devised is one which would dumfounder 
Solomon, because he thought there was nothing new under the sun. Having 
tried Grant twice and found him faithful, we are told that we must not, even 
after an interval of years, trust him again. My countrymen ! my countrymen ! 
what stultification does not such a fallacy involve! The American people ex- 
clude Jefferson Davis from public trust. Why? why? Because he was the arch- 
traitor and would-be destroyer ; and now the same people are asked to ostracize 
Grant, and not to trust him. Why? why? I repeat; because he was the arch- 
preserver of his country, and because, not only in war, but twice as Civil Magis- 
trate, he gave his highest, noblest efforts to the Republic. Is this an election- 
eering juggle, or is it hypocrisy's masquerade? There is no field of human 
activity, responsibility, or reason in which rational beings object to an agent 
because he has been weighed in the balance and not found wanting. There is, 
I say, no department of human reason in which sane men reject an agent because 
he has had experience, making him exceptionally competent and fit. From 
the man who shoes your horse, to the lawyer who tries your case, the officer 
who manages your railway or your mill, the doctor into whose hands you give 
your life, or the minister who seeks to save your soul, what man do you reject 
because by his works you have known him and found him faithful and fit? 
What makes the presidential ofiiice an exception to all things else in the common 
sense to be applied to selecting its incumbent? Who dares — who dares to put 
fetters on that free choice and judgment which is the birthright of the Ameri- 
can people? Can it be said that Grant has used official power and place to 
perpetuate his term ? He has no place, and official power has not been used for 
him. Without patronage and without emissaries, without committees, without 
bureaus, without telegraph wires running from his house to this convention, or 
running from his house anywhere else, this man is the candidate whose friends 
have never threatened to bolt unless this convention did as they said. Pie is a 
Republican who never wavers. He and his friends stand by the creed and the 
candidates of the Republican party. They hold the rightful rule of the majority 
as the very essence of their faith, and they mean to uphold that faith against not 
only the common enemy, but against the charlatans, jayhawkers, tramps and 
guerillas — the men who deploy between the lines, and forage now on one side 
and then on the other. This convention is master of a supreme opportunity. It 
can name the next President. It can make sure of his election. It can make 



368 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



sure not only of his election, but of his certain and peaceful inauguration. More 
than all, it can break that power which dominates and mildews the South. It 
can overthrow an organization whose very existence is a standing protest against 
progress. 

The purpose of the Democratic party is spoils. Its very hope of existence is 
a solid South. Its success is a menace to order and prosperity. I say this con- 
vention can overthrow that power. It can dissolve and emancipate a solid 
South. It can speed the nation in a career of grandeur eclipsing all past achieve- 
m.ents. 

Gentlemen, we have only to listen above the din and look beyond the dust 
of an hour to behold the Republican party advancing with its ensigns resplendent 
v.-ith illustrious achievements, marching to certain and lasting victory with its 
greatest marshal at its head. 

(Delivered in the Convention of the Republican party at Chicago, June 6, 1880.) 





THE AMERICAN INDIANS. 369 



The American Indians. 

By JOSEPH STORY, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1779, died 1845.) 



HERE is, indeed, in the fate of these unfortunate beings, much to 
awaken our sympathy, and much to disturb the sobriety of our 
judgment; much which may be urged to excuse their own atroci- 
ties; much in their characters, which betrays us into an involun- 
tary admiration. What can be more melancholy than their history? 
By a law of their nature, they seem destined to a slow, but sure 
extinction. Everywhere, at the approach of the white man, they fade away. 
We hear the rustling of their footsteps, like that of the withered leaves of 
autumn, and they are gone forever. They pass mournfully by us, and they 
return no more. Two centuries ago, the smoke of their wigwams and the fires 
of their councils rose in every valley, from Hudson's Bay to the farthest Florida, 
from the ocean to the Mississippi and the lakes. The shouts of victory and 
the war-dance rang through the mountains and the glades. The thick arrows 
and the deadly tomahawk whistled through the forests; and the hunter's trace 
and the dark encampment startled the wild beasts in their lairs. The warriors 
stood forth in their glory. The young listened to the songs of other days. 
The mothers played with their infants, and gazed on the scene with warm 
hopes of the future. The aged sat down; but they wept not. They should 
soon be at rest in fairer regions, where the Great Spirit dwelt, in a home pre- 
pared for the brave, beyond the western skies. Braver men never lived; truer 
men never drew the bow. They had courage, and fortitude, and sagacity, and 
perseverance, beyond most of the human race. They shrank from no dangers, 
and they feared no hardships. If they had the vices of savage life, they had the 
virtues also. They were true to their country, their friends, and their homes. 
If they forgave not injury, neither did they forget kindness. If their vengeance 
was terrible, their fidelity and generosity were unconquerable also. Their love, 
like their hate, stopped not on this side of the grave. 

But where are they? Where are the villages, and warriors, and youth; 
the sachems and the tribes; the hunters and their families? They have perished. 




Joseph Story. 



THE AMERICAN INDIANS. 



371 



They are consumed. The wasting pestilence has not alone done the mighty 
work. No — nor famine, nor war. There has been a mightier power, a moral 
canker, which hath eaten into their heart-cores — a plague, which the touch 
of the white man communicated — a poison which betrayed them into a linger- 
ing ruin. The winds of the Atlantic fan not a single region which they may now 
call their own. Already the last feeble remnants of the race are preparing for 
their journey beyond the Mississippi. I see them leave their miserable homes, 
the aged, the helpless, the women, and the warriors, " few and faint, yet fearless 
still." The ashes are cold on their native hearths. The smoke no longer curls 
round their lowly cabins. They move on with a slow, unsteady step. The 
white man is upon their heels, for terror or despatch; but they heed him not. 
They turn to take a last look of their deserted villages. They cast a last glance 
upon the graves of their fathers. They shed no tears; they utter no cries; they 
heave no groans. There is something in their hearts which passes speech. 
There is something in their looks, not of vengeance or submission, but of 
hard necessity, which stifles both; which chokes all utterance; which has no 
aim or method. It is courage absorbed in despair. They linger but for a 
moment. Their look is onward. They have passed the fatal stream. It shall 
never be repassed by them — no, never. Yet there lies not between us and 
them an impassable gulf. They know and feel that there is for them still one 
remove farther, not distant nor unseen. It is to the general burial-ground of 
their race. 

(From a speech before the Essex Historical Society in commemoration of the First Settlement of Salem.) 




372 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Henry of Navarre Speech, 



By JUDGE WEST, the Blind Orator of Ohio. 




S a delegate in the Chicago Convention of i860, the proudest service 
of my Hfe was performed by voting for the nomination of that 
inspired emancipator, the first RepubUcan President of the United 
States. Four-and-twenty years of the grandest history in recorded 
times have distinguished the ascendency of the Repubhcan party. 
The skies have lowered and reverses have threatened, but our flag 
is still there, waving above the mansion of the Presidency, not a stain on its 
folds, not a cloud on its glory. Whether it shall maintain that grand ascend- 
ency depends upon the action of this great council. With bated breath a 
nation awaits the result. On it are fixed the eyes of twenty millions of Repub- 
lican freemen in the North. On it, or to it, rather, are stretched forth the 
imploring hands of ten millions of political bondmen of the South, while above, 
from the portals of light, is looking down the spirit of the immortal martyr 
who first bore it to victory, bidding to us hail and God speed. Six times, in 
six campaigns, has that symbol of union, freedom, humanity, and progress 
been borne in triumph ; sometime by that silent man of destiny, the Welling- 
ton of American arms, Ulysses the Great ; last by that soldier-statesman at 
whose untimely taking off a nation swelled the funeral cries and wept above 
great Garfield's grave. 

Shall that banner triumph again? Commit it to the bearing of that chief 
(A voice, " James G. Blaine, of Maine." Cheers), commit it to the bearing of 
that chief, the inspiration of whose illustrious character and great name will 
fire the hearts of our young men, stir the blood of our manhood, and rekindle 
the fervor of the veterans, and the closing of the seventh campaign will see 
that holy ensign spanning the sky like a bow of promise. Political conditions 
are changed since the accession of the Republican party to power. The mighty 
issues of the freed and bleeding humanity which convulsed the continent and 
rocked the Republic, rallied, united, and inspired the forces of patriotism and 
philanthropy in one consolidated phalanx — these great issues have ceased 
their contentions. The subordinate issues resulting therefrom are settled and 




Judge W. H. West. 



374 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

buried away with the dead issues of the past. The arms of the solid South 
are against us. Not an Electoral gun can be expected from that section. If 
triumph comes, the Republican States of the North must furnish the conquer- 
ing battalions. From the farm, the anvil, the loom, from the mines, the work- 
shop, and the desk, from the hut of the trapper on the snowy Sierras, from the 
hut of the fisherman on the banks of the Hudson, must these forces be drawn. 

Does not sound political wisdom dictate and demand that a leader shall be 
given to them whom our people will follow, not as conscripts advancing by 
funeral marches to certain defeat, but a grand civic hero, whom the souls of 
the people desire, and whom they will follow with all the enthusiasm of vol- 
unteers as they sweep on and onward to certain victory — a representative of 
American manhood — a representative of that living Republicanism that 
demands the amplest industrial protection and opportunity whereby labor shall 
be enabled to earn and eat the bread of independent employment, relieved of 
mendicant competition with pauper Europe or pagan China? 

In the contention of forces for political dominion, to whom as a candidate 
shall be intrusted the bearing of our battle flag? Citizens, I am not here to 
do it, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth if I do abate one 
tithe from the just fame, integrity, and public honor of Chester A. Arthur, 
our President. I abate not one tithe from fhe just fame and public integrity 
of George F. Edmunds, of Joseph R. Hawley, of John Sherman, 'of that grand, 
old, black eagle of Illinois (here the speaker was interrupted several moments 
I by prolonged applause), and I am proud to know that these distinguished 

Senators whom I have named have borne like testimony to the public life, the 
public character, and the public integrity of him whose confirmation by their 
votes elevated him to the highest office — second in dignity only to the office 
of the President himself — the first premiership in the Administration of James 
A. Garfield. A man who was good enough for these great senatorial rivals 
to confirm in the high office of the first premiership of the Republic is good 
enough for the support of a plain, flesh-and-blood God's people for President. 
Who shall be our candidate? (Cries of "Blaine," "Arthur," and "Logan." 
A loud voice above the tumult: " Give us Black Jack and we will elect him.") 
Not the representative of a particular interest or a particular class. Send the 
great apostle to the country labeled the doctors' candidate, the lawyers' candi- 
date, the Wall street candidate, and the hand of resurrection would not fathom 
his November grave. 

Gentlemen, he must be a representative of that Republicanism that 
demands the absolute political as well as personal emancipation and disen- 
thralment of mankind — a representative of that Republicanism which recog- 



THE HENRY OF NAVARRE SPEECH. 375 

nizes the stamp of American citizenship as the passport of every right, privi- 
lege, and consideration at home or abroad, whether under the sky of Bis- 
marck, under the palmetto, under the pelican, or on the banks of the Mohawk 
— that Republicanism that regards with dissatisfaction a despotism which under 
the sic semper tyrannis of the Old Dominion annihilates by slaughter popular 
majorities in the name of Democracy — a Republicanism which, while avoid- 
ing entangling alliances with foreign powers, will accept insult and humiliation 
from no Prince, State, Potentate or Sovereignty on earth — a R'epublicanism 
as embodied and stated in the platform of principles this day adopted by your 
convention, gentlemen, such a representative Republican, enthroned in the 
hearts and affections of the people, is James G. Blaine, of Maine. His cam- 
paign would commence to-morrow, and continue until victory is assured. 
There would be no powder burned to fire into the back of leaders. It would 
only be exploded to illuminate the inauguration. The brazen throats of can- 
non in yonder square, waiting to herald the result of this convention, would 
not have time to cool before his name would be caught up on ten thousand 
tongues of electric flame. It would sweep down from the Old Pine Tree State. 
It would go over the hills and valleys of New England. It would insure you 
Connecticut by ten thousand majority. It would weld together with fervent 
heat the dissensions in New York. It would blaze through the State of Gar- 
field, that daughter of Connecticut, more beautiful than her mother. 

Gentlemen of the Convention, it has been said that in making this nomi- 
nation every other consideration should merge, every other interest be sacri- 
ficed, in order and with a view exclusively to secure the Republican vote and 
carry the State of New York. Gentlemen, the Republican party demands of 
this Convention a nominee whose inspiration and glorious prestige shall carry 
the Presidency with or without the State of New York ; that will carry the 
Legislatures of the several States and avert the sacrifice of the United States 
Senate ; that shall sweep into the tide sufficient congressional districts to 
redeem the House of Representatives and restore it to the Republican party. 

Gentlemen, three millions of Republicans believe that the man to accom- 
plish this is the Ajax Telamon of our party, who made — and whose life is — 
a conspicuous part of its glorious history. Through all the conflicts of its 
progress, from the baptism of blood on the plains of Kansas to the fall of the 
immortal Garfield, whenever humanity needed succor, or freedom needed pro- 
tection, or country a champion, wherever blows fell thickest and fastest, there, 
in the fore front of the battle, was seen to wave the white plume of James G. 
Blaine, our Henry of Navarre. Nominate him, and the shouts of September 
victory in Maine will be re-echoed back by the thunders of the October victory 



376 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

no more distract, and where the conditions are most favorable for noble and 
enduring achievement. His upward path had been through stormy adversity 
in Ohio. Nominate him, and the campfires and beacon-lights will illuminate 
the continent from the Golden Gate to Cleopatra's Needle. Nominate him, 
and the millions who are now in waiting will rally to swell the column of vic- 
tory that is sweeping on. In the name of a majority of the delegates from the 
Republican States, and their glorious constituencies who must fight this battle, 
I nominate James G. Blaine, of Maine. 

(Delivered at the Republican Convention at Chicago, June 5, 1884, in nomination of James G. Blaine.) 



N?,- 







DEATH OF BEN. HILL. 377 



Death of Ben. HHI. 

By JOHN J. INGALLS, of Kansas. 

(Born 1833, died 1900.) 



R. PRESIDENT : Ben. Hill has gone to the undiscovered country. 
Whether his journey thither was but one step across an impercep- 
tible frontier, or whether an interminable ocean, black, unfluctu- 
ating, and voiceless, stretches between these earthly coasts and 
those invisible shores ■ — we do not know. 

Whether on that August morning after death, he saw a more 
glorious sun rise with unimaginable splendor above a celestial horizon, or 
whether his apathetic and unconscious ashes still sleep in cold obstruction and 
insensible oblivion — we do not know. 

Whether his strong and subtle energies found instant exercise in another 
forum, whether his dexterous and undisciplined faculties are now contending 
in a higher senate than ours for supremacy, or whether his powers were dissi- 
pated and dispersed with his parting breath — we do not know. 

Whether his passions, ambitions, and afifections still sway, attract, and 
impel, whether he yet remembers us as we remember him — we do not know. 

These are the unsolved, the insolvable problems of mortal life and human 
destiny, which prompted the troubled patriarch to ask that momentous ques- 
tion, for which the centuries have given no answer: " If a man die, shall he 
live again ? " 

Every man is the center of a circle, whose fatal circumference he cannot 
pass. Within its narrow confines he is potential, beyond it, he perishes; and 
if immortality is a splendid, but delusive dream, if the incompleteness of every 
career, even the longest and most fortunate, be not supplemented and per- 
fected after its termination here, then he who dreads to die should fear to live, 
for life is a tragedy more desolate and inexplicable than death. 

Of all the dead whose obsequies we have paused to solemnize in this 
Chamber, I recall no one whose untimely fate seems so lamentable, and yet 
so rich in prophecy as that of Senator Hill. He had reached the meridian of 
his years. He stood upon the high plateau of middle life, in that serene 
atmosphere where temptation no longer assails, where the clamorous passions 




John J. Ingalls. 



DEATH OF BEN. HILL. 379 

and contention, such as infrequently fall to the lot of men. Though not with- 
out the tendency to meditation, revery, and introspection which accompanies 
genius, his temperament was palestric. He was competitive and unpeaceful. 
He was born a polemic and controversialist, intellectually pugnacious and 
combative, so that he was impelled to defend any position that might be 
assailed, or to attack any position that might be intrenched, not because the 
defense or assault was essential, but because the positions were maintained, 
and that those who held them became, by that fact alone, his adversaries. This 
tendency of his nature made his orbit erratic. He was meteoric, rather than 
planetary, and flashed with irregular splendor, rather than shone with steady 
and penetrating rays. His advocacy of any cause was fearless to the verge of 
temerity. He appeared to be indifferent to applause or censure, for their own 
sake. He accepted intrepidly any conclusion that he reached, without inquir- 
ing whether they were politic or expedient. 

To such a spirit, partisanship was unavoidable, but with Senator Hill it 
did not degenerate into bigotry, ^e was capable of broad generosity, and 
extended to his opponents the same unreserved candor which he demanded 
for himself. His oratory was impetuous, and devoid of artifice. He was not 
a posturer or phrase-monger. He was too intense, too earnest, to employ the 
cheap and paltry decorations of discourse. He never reconnoitered a hostile 
position, nor approached it by stealthy parallels. He could not lay siege to 
an enemy, nor beleaguer him, nor open trenches, and sap and mine. His 
method was the charge and the onset. He was the Murat of senatorial debate. 
Not many men of this generation have been better equipped for parliamentary 
warfare, than he, with his commanding presence, his sinewy diction, his con- 
fidence, and imperturbable self-control. 

But in the maturity of his powers and his fame, with unmeasured oppor- 
tunities for achievement apparently before him, with great designs unaccom- 
plished, surrounded by the proud and affectionate solicitude of a great con- 
stituency, the pallid messenger with the inverted- torch beckoned him to depart. 
There are few scenes in history more tragic than that protracted combat with 
death. No man had greater inducements to live. But in the long struggle 
against the inexorable advances of an insidious and mortal malady, he did not 
falter nor repine. He retreated with the aspect of a victor, and though he 
succumbed, he seemed to conquer. His sun went 'down at noon, but it sank 
amid the prophetic splendors of an eternal dawn. 

With more than a hero's courage, with more than a martyr's fortitude, he 
waited the approach of the inevitable hour, and went to the undiscovered 
country. 

(Being a speech delivered in the United States Senate, January 23, 1882.) 




38o • MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Science and Literature. 

By JAMES KENT, of New York. 

(Born 1763, died 1847.) 



HE tendency of some modern theories of education is to depress the 
study of ancient languages and literature, and to raise up in their 
stead a more exclusive devotion to the exact sciences and mechanical 
philosophy. But this would be to prefer the study of the laws of matter 
to the study of man as an intellectual, moral, and accountable being. 
And when we duly consider how unspeakably important, and how 
intensely interesting is the knowledge of our race, of their history, their govern- 
ments, their laws, their duties, their, languages, and their final destiny, we shall 
not be disposed to undervalue literary pursuits, or to think lightly of the cultiva- 
tion of the moral sciences and the study of the rights and history of man as a 
member of civil society. Nothing contributes more to elevate and adorn the 
character of a nation than the refinements of taste, the embellishments of tht 
arts, the spirit of freedom, the love of justice, and the study and imitation of those 
exalted endowments and illustrious actions, of which history furnishes the exam- 
ples, and which " give ardor to virtue and confidence to truth." 

But I wish not to be misunderstood. I entertain no narrow or hostile preju- 
dice to a course of scientific education. Such a course is adapted to the wants 
and business of society, and this college has very wisely met on that subject the 
spirit of the times, and given a more extended and closer attention than formerly 
to the various branches of the mathematics and of the physical sciences. No 
one can contemplate, without astonishment and admiration, the splendid discov- 
eries and improvements which have been made, ever since the beginning of the 
present century, in astronomy, electricity, chemistry, mineralogy, geology, and 
the mechanic arts, nor will he be destitute of a glow of gratitude for the skillful 
and triumphant application of those sciences to commercial, agricultural, manu- 
facturing and domestic purposes. They have contributed in a wonderful degree 
to abridge labor, facilitate intercourse, accumulate products, enlarge commerce, 
multiply the comforts of life, and elevate the power and character of the nation. 
My only wish is that science and literature may flourish in concert, and the one 




James Kent. 



382 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

is not to regard the other as a useless or dangerous rival. They are necessary 
helps to each other; and he who deals constantly in matters of fact, with strict 
method and patient induction, will find his whole moral constitution to stand 
greatly in need, from time to time, of the invigorating warmth and impulse of 
the creations of genius. The college was founded with the generous intention 
of teaching in due proportion literature and science, and this is all that we can 
wish or ought to contend for. If literature eloquently recommends and ele- 
gantly adorns science, the latter supplies that knowledge of the laws of the visible 
creation, and of those astonishing combinations by which it is directed, that 
imparts to literature its highest dignity. Science furnishes arguments and helps 
to ethics and to some parts of civil jurisprudence, and it supplies eloquence 
and poetry with much of that beautiful, affecting, and sublime imagery, which 
accompanies them in their most animated strains and loftiest effusions. 

(Being part of an address before the Phi Beta Kappa Society in 1831.) 





THE DUTY OF SCHOLARSHIP. 383 



The Duty of Scholarship. 

By WENDELL PHILLIPS, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 181 1, died 1884.) 



IFTY millions of men God gives us to mould ; burning questions, keen 
debate, great interests trying to vindicate their right to be, sad wrongs 
brought to the bar of public judgment, — these are the people's schools. 
Timid scholarship either shrinks from sharing in these agitations, or 
denounces them as vulgar and dangerous interference by incompetent 
hands with matters above them. A chronic distrust of the people 
pervades the book-educated class of the North ; they shrink from the free speech 
which is God's normal school for educating men, throwing upon them the grave 
responsibility of deciding great questions, and so lifting them to a higher level of 
intellectual and moral life. Trust the people — the wise and the ignorant, the 
good and the bad — with the gravest questions, and in the end you educate the 
race ; while you secure, not perfect institutions, not necessarily good ones, but the 
best institutions possible while human nature is the basis and the only material 
to build with. 

Men are educated and the State uplifted by allowing all — every one — to 
broach all their mistakes and advocate all their errors. 

The community that will not protect its humblest, most ignorant, and most 
hated member in the free utterance of his opinions, no matter how false or 
hateful, is only a gang of slaves ! 

Anarcharsis went into the Archon's Court at Athens, heard a case argued 
by the great men of that city, and saw the vote by five hundred men. Walking 
in the streets, some one asked him, " What do you think of Athenian liberty ? " 
" I think," said he, " wise men argue cases, and fools decide them." Just what 
that timid scholar, two thousand years ago, said in the streets of Athens, that 
which calls itself scholarship here says to-day of popular agitation, — that it 
lets wise men argue questions and fools decide them. But that Athens where 
fools decided the gravest questions of policy and of right and wrong, where 
property you had gathered wearily to-day might be wrung from you by the 



384 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

caprice of the mob to-morrow, — that very Athens probably secured 
the greatest amount of human happiness and nobleness of its era ; 
invented art, and sounded for us the depths of philosophy. God lent to it the 
largest intellects, and it flashes to-day the torch that gilds yet the mountain- 
peaks of the Old World: while Egypt, the hunker conservative of antiquity, 
where nobody dared to differ from the priest, or to be wiser than his grand- 
father ; where men pretended to be alive, though swaddled in the grave-clothes 
of creed and custom as close as their mummies were in linen, — that Egypt is hid 
in the tomb it inhabited, and the intellect Athens has trained for us digs to-day 
those ashes to find out what buried and forgotten hunkerism knew and did. 

Suppose that universal suffrage endangered peace and threatened property. 
There is something more valuable than wealth, there is something more sacred 
than peace. As Humboldt says, " The finest fruit earth holds up to its Maker is 
a man." To ripen, lift, and educate a man is the first duty. Trade, law, learning, 
science, and religion are only the scaffolding wherewith to build a man. Despot- 
ism looks down into the poor man's cradle, and knows it can crush resistance 
and curb ill will. Democracy sees the ballot in that baby hand ; and selfishness 
bids her put integrity on one side of those baby footsteps and iriJ:eUigence:Dn the 
other, lest her own hearth be in peril. Thank God for his method of taking 
bonds of wealth and culture to share all their blessings with the humblest soul 
he gives to their keeping! The American should cherish as serene a faith as 
his fathers had. Instead of seeking a coward safety by. battening down the. 
hatches, and putting men back into chains, he should recognize that God places.' 
him in this peril that he may work out a noble security by .concentrating all. rrioral 
forces to lift this weak, rotting, and dangerous mass into sunlight and:health.' 
The fathers touched their highest level when, with stout-hearted and .serene 
faith, they trusted God that it was safe to leave men with all the rights' he gave. 
them. Let us be worthy of their blood, and save this sheet-anchor of the>ace, — .' 
universal suffrage, — God's church, God's school, God's method of gently bind- 
ing men into commonwealths, in order that they may at last melt into brothers. 

(Being part of an address before the Phi Beta Kappa Society in 1881.) 




STRENGTH OF SELF-GOVERNMENT. 385 



Strength of Self-Government. 

By HENRY WARD BEECHER, of New York. 

(Born 1813, died 1887.) 

F you measure a man by the skill that he can exhibit, and the fruit of it, 
there is great distinction between one and another. Men are not each 
worth the same thing to society. All men cannot think with a like 
value, nor work with a like product. And if you measure man as a 
producing creature — that is, in his secular relations — men are not 
alike valuable. But when you measure men on their spiritual side, 
and in their affectional relations to God and the eternal world, the lowest man 
is so immeasurable in value that you cannot make any practical difference 
between one man and another. Although, doubtless, some are vastly above, 
the lowest and least goes beyond your powers of conceiving, and your power 
of measuring. This is the root idea, which, if not recognized, is yet operative. It 
is the fundamental principle of our American scheme, that is, Man is above 
nature. Man, by virtue of his original endowment and affiliation to the Eternal 
Father, is superior to every other created thing. There is nothing to be com- 
pared with man. All governments are from him and for him, and not over him 
and upon him. All institutions are not his masters, but his servants. All days, 
all ordinances, all usages, come to minister to the chief and the king, — God's son, 
man, of whom God only is master. Therefore, he is to be thoroughly enlarged, 
thoroughly empowered by development, and then thoroughly trusted. This is 
the American idea, — for we stand in contrast with the world in holding and 
teaching it ; that men, having been once thoroughly educated, are to be absolutely 
trusted. 

The education of the common people follows, then, as a necessity. They 
are to be fitted to govern. Since all things are from them and for them, they 
must be educated to their function, to their destiny. No pains are spared, we 
know, in Europe, to educate princes and nobles who are to govern. No expense 
is counted too great, in Europe, to prepare the governing classes for their func- 
tion. America has her governing class, too ; and that governing class is the whole 
people. It is a slower work, because it is so much larger. It is never carried so 
high, because there is so much more of it. It is easy to lift up a crowned class. 



386 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

It is not easy to lift up society from the very foundation. That is the work of 
centuries. And, therefore, though we have not an education so deep nor so high 
as it is in some other places, we have it broader than it is anywhere else in the 
world; and we have learned that, for ordinary affairs, intelligence among the 
common people is better than treasures of knowledge among particular classes 
of the people. . School books do more for the country than encycloptedias. 

And so there comes up the American conception of a common people as an 
order of nobility, or as standing in the same place to us that orders of nobility 
stand to other peoples. Not that, after our educated men and men of genius 
are counted out, we call all that remain the common people. The whole com- 
munity, top and bottom and intermediate, the strong and the weak, the rich 
and the poor, the leaders ,and the followers, constitute with us the common- 
wealth ; in which laws spring from the people, administration conforms to their 
wishes, and they are made the final judges of every interest of the State. 

In America, there is not one single element of civilization that is not made to 
depend, in the end, upon public opinion. Art, law, administration, policy, refor- 
mation of morals, religious teaching, all derive, in our form of society, the most 
potent influence from the common people. For although the common people 
are educated in preconceived notions of religion, the great intuitions and instincts 
of the heart of man rise up afterward, and in their turn influence back. So there 
is action and reaction. 

It is this very thing that has led men that are educated, in Europe, to doubt 
the stability of our nation. Owing to a strange ignorance on their part, our 
glory has seemed to them our shame, and our strength has seemed to them our 
weakness, and our invincibility has seemed to them our disaster and defeat. 

This impression of Europeans has been expressed in England in language 
that has surprised us, and that one day will surprise them. We know more of it 
in England because the English language is our mother tongue, and we are 
more concerned to know what England thinks of us than any other nation. 

But it is impossible that nations educated into sympathy with strong gov- 
ernments, and with the side of those that govern, should sympathize with the gov- 
erned. In this country the sympathy goes with the governed, and not with the 
governing, as much as in the other countries it goes with the governing, and not 
with the governed. And abroad, they are measuring by a false rule, and by a 
home-bred and one-sided sympathy. 

It is impossible for men who have not seen it to understand that there is no 
society possible that will bear such expansion and contraction, such strains and 
burdens, as a society made up of free educated common people, with democratic 



STRENGTH OF SELF-GOVERNMENT. 387 

institutions. It has been supposed that such a society was the most unsafe, and 
the least capable of control, of any. But, whether tested by external pressure, 
or, as now, by the most wondrous internal evils, an educated democratic people 
is the strongest government that can be made on the face of the earth. 

In no other form of society is it so safe to set discussion at large. Nowhere 
else is there such safety in the midst of apparent conflagration. Nowhere else i-~ 
there such entire rule, when there seems to be such entire anarchy. 

A foreigner would think, pending a presidential election, that the end of 
the world had come. The people roar and dash like an ocean. " No govern- 
ment," he would say, "was ever strong enough to hold such wild and tumultuous 
enthusiasm, and zeal, and rage." True. There is not a government strong 
enough to hold them. Nothing but self-government will do it: that will. 
Educate men to take care of themselves, individually and in masses, and then 
let the winds blow; then let the storms fall; then let excitements burn, and 
men will learn to move freely upon each other, as do drops of water in the ocean. 
Our experience from generation to generation has shown that, though we may 
have fantastic excitements ; though the whole land may seem to have swung 
from its moorings on a sea of the wildest agitation, we have only to let the 
silent dropping paper go into the box, and that is the end of the commotion. 
To-day, the flames mount to heaven; and on every side you hear the most 
extravagant prophecies and the fiercest objurgations ; and both sides know that, 
if they do not succeed, the end of the world will have come. But to-morrow 
the vote is declared, and each side go home laughing, to take hold of the plow 
and the spade ; and they are satisfied that the nation is safe after all. 




388 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 




The Upright Judge. 

By RUFUS CHOATE, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1799, died 1859.) 



N the first place, he should be profoundly learned in all the learning of 
the law, and he must know how to use that learning. Will anyone 
stand up here to deny this ? In this day, boastful, glorious for its ad- 
vancing, popular, professional, scientific, and all education, will any- 
one disgrace himself by doubting the necessity of deep and continued 
studies, and various and thorough attainments to the bench? He is 
to know not merely the law which you make, and the Legislature makes, not 
constitutional and statute law alone, but that other ampler, that boundless juris- 
prudence, the common law, which the successive generations of the State have 
silently built up; that old code of freedom which we brought with us in The 
May-flozvcr and Arabella, but which, in the progress of centuries, we have 
ameliorated and enriched, and adapted wisely to the necessities of a busy, pros- 
perous, and wealthy community — that he must know. 

And where to find it? In volumes which you must count by hundreds, by 
thousands ; filling libraries ; exacting long labors — the labors of a lifetime, ab- 
stracted from business, from politics ; but assisted by taking part in an active 
judicial administration; such labors as produced the wisdom and won the fame 
of Parsons, and Marshall, and Kent, and Story, and Holt, and Mansfield. If 
your system of appointment and tenure does not present a motive, a help for 
such labors and such learning, if it discourages, if it disparages them, in so far 
it is a failure. 

In the next place, he must be a man not merely upright ; not merely honest 
and well-intentioned — this of course — but a man who will not respect persons 
in judgment. And does not everyone here agree to this also? Dismissing for 
a moment all theories about the mode of appointing him, or the time for which 
he shall hold office, sure I am we all demand that, as far as human virtue, as- 
sisted by the best contrivances of human wisdom, can attain to it, he shall not 
respect persons in judgment. He shall know nothing about the parties, every- 



THE UPRIGHT JUDGE. 389 

thing about the case. He shall do everything for justice, nothing for himself ; 
nothing for his friend, nothing for his patrons, nothing for his sovereign. 

If, on one side, is the executive power and the Legislature and the people — 
the sources of his honors, the givers of his daily bread — and on the other an 
individual, nameless and odious, his eye is to see neither great nor small, attend- 
ing only to the trepidations of the balance. If a law is passed by a unanimous 
Legislature, clamored for by the general voice of the public, and a cause is before 
him on it, in which the whole community is on one side and an individual name- 
less or odious on the other, and he believes it to be against the Constitution, he 
must so declare it, or there is no judge. If Athens comes there to demand that 
the cup of hemlock be put to the lips of the wisest of men, and he believes that 
he has not corrupted the youth, nor omitted to zvorship the gods of the city, nor intro- 
duced new divinities of his own, he must deliver him, although the thunder light 
on the unterrified brow. 

And, finally, he must possess the perfect confidence of the community, that 
he bear not the sword in vain. To be honest, to be no respecter of persons, is 
not yet enough. He must be believed such. I should be glad so far to indulge 
an old-fashioned and cherished professional sentiment as to say that I would 
have something venerable and illustrious attach to his character and function, -in 
the judgment and feelings of the commonwealth. 

But if this should be thought a little above or behind the time, I do not 
fear that I subject myself to the ridicule of anyone when I claim that he be a 
man toward whom the love and trust and affectionate admiration of the people 
should flow; not a man perching for a winter and summer in our courthouses 
and then gone forever ; but one to whose benevolent face, and bland and digni- 
fied manners, and firm administration of the whole learning of the law, we be- 
come accustomed ; whom our eyes anxiously, not in vain, explore when we 
enter the temple of justice; toward whom our attachment and trust grow ever 
with the growth of his own reputation : I would have him one who might look 
back from the venerable last years of Mansfield or Marshall and recall such 
testimonies as these to the great and good judge: 

" The young men saw me and hid themselves, and the aged arose and 
stood up. 

" The princes refrained from talking, and laid their hand upon their mouth. 

" When the ear heard me, then it blessed me, and when the eye saw me, it 
gave witness to me. 

" Because I delivered the poor that cried, and the fatherless, and him that 
had none to help him. 



390 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



" The blessing of him that was ready to perish came upon me, and I caused 
the widow's heart to sing for joy. 

" I put on righteousness, and it clothed me. My judgment was as a robe 
and a diadem. I was eyes to the blind, and feet was I to the lame. 

" I was a father to the poor, and the cause which I knew not I searched out. 

" And I brake the jaws of the wicked, and I plucked the spoil out of his 
teeth." 

Give to the community such a judge, and I care little who makes the rest 
of the Constitution, or what party administers it. It will be a free government I 
know. Let us repose secure under the shade of a learned, impartial, and trusted 
magistracy, and we need no more. 

« 

(Being part of tho famous convention speech of 1853.) 





THE POWER OF GREATNESS. 391 



The Power of Greatness. 

By THEODORE PARKER, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1810, died i860.) 



N general, greatness is eminence of ability ; so there are as many different 
forms thereof as there are qualities wherein a man may be eminent. 
These various forms of greatness should be distinctly marked, that, 
when we say a man is great, we may know exactly what we mean. 

In the rudest ages, when the body is man's only tool for work or 
war, eminent strength of body is the thing most coveted. Then, and 
so long as human affairs are controlled by brute force, the giant is thought to be 
the great man — is held in honor for his eminent brute strength. 

When men have a little outgrown that period of force, cunning is the 
quality most prized. The nimble brain outwits the heavy arm, and brings the 
circumvented giant to the ground. He who can overreach his antagonist, 
plotting more subtly, winning with more deceitful skill ; who can turn and 
double on his unseen track, " can smile and smile, and be a villain," — he is the 
great man. 

Brute force is merely animal ; cunning is the animalism of the intellect — 
the mind's least intellectual element. 

As men go on in their development, finding qualities more valuable than 
the strength of the lion or the subtlety of the fox, they come to value higher intel- 
lectual faculties — great understanding, great imagination, great reason. Power 
to think is then the faculty men value most ; ability to devise means for attaining 
ends desired ; the power to originate ideas, to express them in speech, to organize 
them into institutions ; to organize things into a machine, men. into an army 
or a state, or a gang of operatives ; to administer these various organizations. 
He who is eminent in this ability is thought the great man. 

But there are qualities nobler than the mere intellect — the moral, the 
affectional, the religious faculties — the power of justice, of love, of holiness, 
of trust in God, and of obedience to his law — the eternal right. These are the 
highest qualities of man ; whoso is most eminent therein is the greatest of great 
men. He is as much above the merely intellectual great men, as they above the 
men of mere cunning or force. 



392 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Thus, then, we have four different kinds of greatness. Let me name them — 
bodily greatness, crafty greatness, intellectual greatness, religious greatness. 
Men in different degrees of development will value the different kinds of great- 
ness. Belial cannot yet honor Christ. How can the little girl appreciate Aristotle 
and Kant? The child thinks as a child. You must have manhood in you to 
honor it in others, even to see it. 

Yet how we love to honor men eminent in such modes of greatness as we 
can understand ! Indeed, we must do so. Soon as we really see a real great 
man, his magnetism draws us, will we or no. Do any of you remember when, 
for the first time in adult years, you stood beside the ocean, or some great 
mountain of New Hampshire, or \"irginia, or Pennsylvania, or the mighty 
mounts that rise in Switzerland? Do you remember what emotions came 
upon you at the awful presence ? But if you are confronted by a man of vast 
genius, of colossal history and achievements, inmiense personal power of wis- 
dom, justice, philanthropy, religion, of mighty power of will and mighty act; 
if you feel him as you feel the mountain and the sea, what grander emotions 
spring up ! It is like making the acquaintance of one of the elementary forces of 
the earth — like associating with gravitation itself ! The stiffest neck bends 
over ; down go the democratic knees ; human nature is loyal then ! A New 
England shipmaster, wrecked on an island in the Indian Sea, was seized by his 
conquerors, and made their chief. Their captive became their king. After years 
of rule, he managed to escape. When he once more visited his former realm, 
he found that the savages had carried him to Heaven, and worshipped him as a 
god greater than their fancied deities ; he had revolutionized divinity, and was 
himself enthroned as a god. Why so? In intellectual qualities, in religious 
qualities, he was superior to their idea of God, and so they worshipped him. 
Thus loyal is human nature to its great men. 

Talk of democracy ! — we are all looking for a master ; a man manlier than 
we. We are always looking for a great man to solve the difficulty too hard 
for us, to break the rock which lies in our way. — to represent the possibility of 
human nature as an ideal, and then to realize that ideal in his life. Little boys 
in the country, working against time, with stints to do, long for the passing-by 
of some tall brother, who in a few minutes shall achieve what the smaller boy 
took hours to do. And we are all of us but little boys, looking for some great 
brother to come and help us end our tasks. 

But it is not quite so easy to recognize the greatest kind of greatness. A 
Nootka-Sound Indian would not see much in Leibnitz, Newton, Socrates, or 
Dante ; and if a great man were to come as much before tis as we are before 
the Nootka-Sounders, what should we say of him ? Why, the worst names we 




Theodore Parker. 



394 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

could devise — blasphemer, hypocrite, infidel, atheist. Perhaps, we should dig 
up the old cross, and make a new martyr of the man posterity will worship as a 
deity. It is the men who are up that see the rising sun, not the sluggards. 
It takes greatness to see greatness, and know it at the first; I mean to see 
greatness of the highest kind. Bulk, anybody can see; bulk of body or mind. 
The loftiest form of greatness is never popular in its time. Men cannot under- 
stand or receive it. Guinea negroes would think a juggler a greater man than 
Franklin. What would be thought of Martin Luther at Rome, of Washington 
at St. Petersburg, of Fenelon among the Sacs and Foxes? Herod and Pilate 
were popular in their day, — men of property and standing. They got nomina- 
tions and honor enough. Jesus of Nazareth got no nomination, got a cross 
between two thieves, was crowned with thorns, and, when he died, eleven Gali- 
leans gathered together to lament their Lord. Any man can measure a walk- 
ing-stick, — so many hands long, and so many nails beside ; but it takes a 
mountain intellect to measure the Andes and A.ltai. 

(Being part of an address on the death of Daniel Webster.) 





RAILROADS AND RECREATION. 395 



Railroads and Recreation. 

By CHAUNCEY M. DEPEW, of New York. 

(Born 1834.) 

AM glad to see that your numbers have increased so much since I was 
here one year ago ; whether it is because you have all joined since then, 
or you were not all here at that time, I don't know, but I take it that 
it is because of the additions to the association. 

Our chairman was too modest to-night when he spoke of the ten 
years since this organization was founded, because without him it 
would not have been created, and except for his constant aid and advice it would 
never have reached the position which it has attained to-day ; and when I look 
forward to the next ten years, to the usefulness, the enormous growth, and the 
influences which are to spring from the building upon the corner yonder, also 
built by Mr. Vanderbilt, I believe that the efifect of the work in that building on 
the intellectual, moral, and physical health of the men belonging to the various 
railroads that center at the Grand Central station will extend to every railroad 
in the United States, and that the managers will see to it that an institution so 
useful, an influence so grand, shall be established on their own lines, and build- 
ings of the same character erected out of their own funds at all the principal 
centers where their men gather. 

I was struck with one remark made this afternoon in a conversation with 
Mr. Morse, the Secretary of the International Committee, which looks after this 
branch. He said that since this room was opened the influence had been far- 
reaching, embracing not only the men employed here, but the management of 
other roads themselves ; and alluded to the establishment of branches elsewhere 
as a result of the success which has been attained here. It impressed upon my 
mind the thought that has been there a long time, that there is but one railroad 
in the United States — the New York Central — and that all the others are 
branches. 

The last time I met Morse was in Germany last summer, and like all good 
Americans I wanted to go to Strasburg and see the wonderful clock in the 
famous cathedral. You know about that clock ; it strikes, and the apostles come 
out. They belong to the mechanism which is wound up to go nine hundred and 



396 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

ninety-nine years, and not to stop till the last moment of time. Whether it 
will fulfill its inventor's claims I do not expect to live to see. Well, I went on 
the railroad from Baden-Baden with my family to see that clock. We had fifteen 
minutes leeway when we arrived, and it took seven minutes to get from the 
depot to the cathedral. When half-way to Strasburg I discovered that we were 
twelve minutes late, and I offered the German conductor a month's salary if 
he would make up the time. He told me the next day when I went back that 
he did not get the idea through his head till he came down the next morning. 
He would never do for a conductor on the New York Central. You know how 
it is with German railways — they are run by the Government. There are some 
people who want the railways run by the Government here. Well, a railway 
run by the Government goes this way : an express train makes twenty miles an 
hour, and stops every twenty minutes for refreshments ; and a way train runs 
twelve miles an hour, and stops from thirty to sixty minutes at each station. 
When we reached the depot we liad just five minutes left. I had telegraphed 
for a carriage, and I tumbled my wife and her mother, and " little buster " and 
myself into it, and the courier got on the box and told the coachman to go 
ahead, and then he waved his umbrella and shouted to all the people to get out 
of the way. The first dog that saw us coming gave a yelp, and that started all 
the dogs in Strasburg ])arking and running after us in full chorus ; people jumped 
to one side and shook their heads, and we got to the door of the cathedral just 
as the crowd was coming out — it was all over. When I got inside, the first 
man I saw was Morse ; he was smiling at me like a brightly shining tin-pan on 
a farmer's fence, because I got left. He said: " Depew, when I want to get 
anywhere in time, I go over night." He would not do for a conductor on the 
New York Central. 

Now, very few of us appreciate precisely the amount of growth that starts 
from nothing and in ten years reaches sixty associations and ten thousand mem- 
bers ; but it is like everything connected with the railways in this country — for 
that matter, with everything else in this country — a marvelous growth. It is 
difficult to understand or comprehend that it is less than sixty years since the 
first locomotive was seen in America ; less than sixty years since the first one 
was built by that grand old American, Peter Cooper. Uncle Peter saw the 
locomotive that was brought over here from England, and keeping alert, as 
he always did, and up with the progress of the times, he thought that whatever 
an Englishman could do an American could do a great deal better. And so 
he built his locomotive — the " Tom Thumb." The stage-coach was not going 
to give up so easily, and they put a swift horse on and beat liim — the locomo- 




Chauncey M. Depew. 



398 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

tive ran by a band passing around a cylinder, and the band slipped off — but 
that is the last time for sixty years and forever, that the stage-coach will out- 
run the locomotive. There were only thirteen miles of railroad then in the 
United States ; now there are one hundred and thirty thousand. A fifty-ton 
engine takes seventy-five cars of twenty tons each and draws them along with- 
out an effort ; and as for speed, Mr. Vanderbilt and I ran all day long, a short 
time ago, making an average of fifty-four seconds to the mile, running time, 
and without apparently going at half the speed. 

But the greatest, the most satisfactory, feature of railroad development is 
the men engaged in operating the roads. With those who are actually in the 
service, and those who contribute by supplies, one-tenth of the working force 
of the United States is in the railroad service; and that. tenth includes the most 
energetic men and most intelligent among the workers of this magnificent 
country. There are ten million workingmen in this country, and six hundred 
thousand are directly employed in the railway service. With their families they 
constitute a larger population than the largest of the States. They are a re- 
public in themselves, and yet they are the most loyal, the most law-abiding, 
and most useful and patriotic of citizens. They do not seek aggrandizement 
themselves ; they do not seek by secrecy and force to accomplish selfish pur- 
poses or to do injury to anybody; they simply try to live in a brotherly way 
among those who are engaged in other pursuits, and to labor for the improve- 
ment of the covmtry and the elevation of themselves and of their brethren. Now 
if this republic of railroad men, in these days when all classes of labor are 
organizing, should organize, with their societies, their pass-words, their officers, 
their signs, and their grips, they would constitute one of the most powerful as 
well as intelligent forces in this Republic for good or for evil. They must neces- 
sarily, on account of the business they do and the responsibilities which devolve 
upon them, be men of character, men of intelligence, and men of health ; for 
upon them devolve a larger responsibility and a greater duty than upon any of 
the workers in other pursuits. Men who are engaged in tilling farms, in manu- 
factures, or other lines of business, are all dependent upon the railroads. The 
railroad man is in a sense the servant of them all ; he it is that makes the farm 
worth anything; to him are intrusted the products, the goods, and the lives of 
the people of the country ; it is necessary that he, above all others, should be a 
man upon whom reliance can be placed — a man of character, of courage, of 
strength. 

The railroad is a republic which refutes the theories that come from long- 
haired men who never work themselves. The worst service that is done to the 



RAILROADS AND RECREATION. 399 

workingmen of this country is the Hp service of men who never work and 
could not be made to work. Now we are told that we are in the midst of a 
condition of afifairs where the conflict between labor and capital has become so 
acute and intense that labor is crushed and can never rise. We are told that 
the opportunities which existed in one period of our history for a man to better 
his condition have gone, and that they will never come back again. We are 
told by the reporters that my friend Henry George said, in a speech at Paterson, 
that the condition of the laboring man is worse than that of the Southern slaves 
ever was. Well, I am a worker myself — my condition is a good deal better ; 
you are all workers, and know how absurd is all such talk. The railroad refutes 
these theories practically. The railroad has its rules, its constitutions, its dis- 
cipline ; but what organization amounts to anything without discipline and rule ? 
Rules and discipline are not to oppress anybody, not to take away anybody's 
rights ; but they are to protect the public who use the railway on the one hand, 
and they are to protect the employee who works for the railway on the other ; 
to see that he is not killed by his fellow employees ; to see that no carelessness 
plunges him to his death ; to see that he is not robbed or cheated by his superior 
officers ; to see that he, as well as everybody, is protected. 

There is no democracy like the railway system of this land. Men are not 
taken out of rich men's parlors and placed in positions of responsibility. Men 
are not taken because they are sons of such, and put into paying places in the 
railway system ; but the superintendents all over the country — the men who 
officer and man the passenger, the freight, the motive power and accounting de- 
partments — all of them come up from the bottom. And are you going to stop 
this thing? No; there are no men being born, or to be born, who are to be by 
inheritance the superintendents, treasurers, comptrollers, auditors, the freight 
and ticket agents, the conductors, the yardmasters — who are to be the master 
mechanics, the foremen of the shops of the future. They are not born. They 
have got to be made, and come from the bottom up. And in every one of 
these departments to-day, in every railroad in the United States, in the humblest 
positions, earning the smallest salaries, are men who within the next twenty-five 
years are to fill all these places by promotion. Don't tell me there is no chance 
to rise in this country. There are vacancies to occur in the next thirty years in 
thousands of positions of power, and every one of them will be filled by men 
who prove, by coming up grade by grade, that they have got brains and courage 
and power to fit these offices. 

There is another advantage with railroad men, and that is the permanence 
of their employment. Skilled mechanics have lay-offs, and hard times when 



400 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

there is no work, and periods when through no fault of theirs they are compelled 
to take up any kind of labor which ofifers ; but the employees of the railroad 
are rarely disturbed, and almost every good position on our road is filled by a 
man who has been with the company more than twenty years. 

The best thing I remember connected with myself (and a personal incident 
is always a good one) is, that when I graduated from Yale I thought I would 
lead a life of scholastic ease. I thought I would read and write a little, take it 
easy, and have a good time. I had a hard-headed old father of sturdy Holland- 
Dutch ancestry. He had money enough to take care of me, and I knew it ; and 
when he discovered that I knew it and intended to act accordingly, it was a cold 
day for me, and he said to me : " You will never get a dollar from me except 
through my will. From this time forth' you have got to make your own way." 
Well, I found I had a hard lot of it — nobody had a harder one — and the old 
gentleman stood by and let me tussle and fight it out. I bless him to-night 
with all the heart and gratitude I have for that. If he had taken the other 
course, what would I have done? I would have been up in Peekskill to-night 
nursing a stove, cursing the men who had succeeded in the world, and wonder- 
ing by what exceptional luck they had got on ; but having to dig my way along 
I got beyond everything my father ever dreamed of; but it was done by four- 
teen hours, or sixteen, or eighteen hours work a day, if necessary. It is done 
1)y temperance, by economy; wlien you make a dollar, spend seventy-five cents 
and put the other twenty-five by. Don't bury savings in a stocking, or put then) 
in nickel-plate bonds, but put them in Government bonds, or in a house and lot 

Well, the question occurs, as to this vast body of young men, who have 
before them the opportunity to rise, to share great places in all the railroads of the 
country, " How are they to be trained, saved from temptation, and made better? " 
Now, I suppose that every well-ordered man in the conmumity works about 
ten hours a day. (As I say, I work fourteen hours a day, and have for twenty 
years.) I suppose that he takes seven hours for sleep, two hours for his meals, 
that is nine ; he has at least four hours left. What is he going to do with them ? 
These four hours, if I figure it rightly, amount to two months in a year. No 
man can stand still. When God created us he did a fortunate thing for us ; he 
made us so that we must either go back or forward. A man knows more to-day 
than yesterday, or he knows less. A man who sits down and bottoms a chair, 
and gets up and goes to his meals, and then goes back and bottoms a chair 
again, in the course of five years will be the biggest dunce in the community, 
and his opinion will not be worth knowing. He will lose his power for work 
and will not be worth three cents an hour. A man is just like a locomotive 



RAILROADS AND RECREATION. 401 

always running on an up-grade : Ambition is the engineer, Hope the fireman ; 
the stations where he stops to take in coal and water are home, the church, his 
society, whatever it may be, associations like this, or the library. There are 
no brakes on that engine, and when he stops and the engineer and fireman 
jump off, the engine goes down. Now, he has four hours a day, or two months 
in a year. What is he going to do with them ? A gentleman in the community 

— an exceedingly pleasant gentleman — steps up to him, and says: "I'll tell 
you what to do, my friend." And that gentleman is called the Devil. Some 
people don't believe in a personal Devil ; I do. I meet him every day in my 
life, and he is one of the most agreeable fellows I know. Now he says : " Don't 
mope around home ; don't be bothering your head with the women ; let the 
children go to school and take care of themselves ; don't be sitting down and 
reading books and all that sort of thing ; what you want is recreation." Yes ; 
that's so ; he does want recreation ; he has been at work, perhaps, all night. 
It may be he is a conductor or fireman, or he has been all day in the yard or 
shop. He wants recreation, so the Devil takes him into a poolroom and says : 
" Play a game ; bet )^our money." There is one element, one instinct, dormant 
in every man born into this world, and that is the instinct of gambling. It is 
there, and if the temptation comes, it is bound to be aroused, and once aroused, 
it is the most difficult passion to suppress. The instinct is inflamed, and that 
young mian goes home to his wife feverish, irritable ; comes home another night 
more irritable, more feverish ; his home becomes the last place he wants to see ; 
he anticipates his wages ; borrows against them, if he is in a place where he can 
do it ; he steals ; and then he becomes a thief and fugitive ; and that settles him. 
Or the Devil takes a young man by the arm and says : " Come into the saloon 

— here is a free lunch, free billiards, free dominoes ; take them." Then he says 
to him as he goes out : "Are you going to allow the generous landlord to pro- 
vide all these things and then pay his own rent? " " What shall I do? " " Take 
a drink." "Alone?" "No; treat somebody; call up the boys." In a little 
while he takes him again. He becomes intoxicated; he arouses the notice of 
his superior officers ; he is discharged ; he goes from a house into rooms ; from 
rooms into a single room ; his wife becomes wretched and miserable ; she does 
what she can to earn something; and his children, from being promising and 
beautiful, begin to weaken, go out into the streets and form associations, and 
find them at home in his own language and conduct, that make them subjects 
for the criminal classes of the future. 

Now, it behooves railroads, charitable men. religious men, and men who 
are neither charitable nor religious, but who have homes to take care of and 
lives that they value and want to preserve — it behooves them to provide the 



402 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



recreation for this man. Give him a room more comfortable than the saloon ; 
larger accommodations than the saloon ; games where there is no gambling ; 
libraries where he can select what is in his bent of mind to read ; lectures of the 
best that the minds of men who have devoted their lives to a specific purpose can 
produce ; the stereopticon that will place upon the canvas, almost as real as 
nature, the cities and places of interest throughout the world ; get him to bring 
his wife with him, his children with him, and make him feel that he is a man, 
grown larger to-day than he was yesterday, to be larger to-morrow than he is 
to-day ; that his children are coming up and helping him along ; that the im- 
portant places in the railway, as they become vacant, are to be his. 

Twenty-five years ago in Peekskill I knew every man, woman, and child in 
that place. I was active in every work in the town ; I belonged to the fire com- 
pany ; I made all the speeches on every occasion, and especially at the target 
shoots. I have presented more plated ware from men who wanted to be Con- 
gressmen, county oflficers, members of Assembly, or justices of the peace, and 
who contributed them as prizes for the annual target shoot, than you could 
count ; and in that way I became acquainted with almost everybody in Peekskill. 
And it has been a study with me to mark boys who started in every grade of 
life with myself, to see what has become of them. I was up last fall and began 
to count them over, and it was an instructive exhibit. Some of them became 
clerks, merchants, manufacturers, lawyers, doctors. It was remarkable that 
every one of those who drank is dead; not one living of my age. Barring a few 
who were taken ofi by sickness, every one who proved a wreck and wrecked his 
family did it from rum, and no other caiisc. Of those who were church-going 
people, who were steady, industrious and hard-working men, who were frugal 
and thrifty, every single one. of them, without an exception, owns the house in 
which he lives, and has something laid by, the interest on which, with his house, 
would carry him through many a rainy day. 

(An address on the tenth anniversary of the organization of the R. R. Y. M. C. A. at New York, Janu- 
ary 4, 1887.) 





THE MOTHER'S WONDER. 403 



The Mother's Wonder. 

By PHILLIPS BROOKS, D. D., of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1835, died 1893.) 



HE mother of Jesus is the speaker, and it is of Jesus that she asks her 
question. On the way home from the temple at Jerusalem, where they 
had gone to worship, you remember, they missed the child Jesus from 
their company. On going back they found him in the temple, " sitting 
in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and asking them ques- 
tions." Then it was that his mother said unto him, " Son, why hast 
thou thus dealt with us ? Behold thy father and I have sought thee sorrowing." 
And he said unto them, " How is it that ye sought me ? Wist ye not that I must 
be about my Father's business? " 

" Why hast thou dealt thus with us ? " It is a puzzled question. The boy 
who had been an obedient child in her household, whom she had cared for in 
her own way and found always docile to her guidance, had suddenly passed be- 
yond her and done a thing which she could not understand. It seemed as if 
she had lost him. Her tone is full of love, but there is something almost like 
jealousy about it. He has taken himself into his own keeping, and. this one act 
seems to foretell the time when he will take his whole life into his own hands, 
and leave her outside altogether. The time has past when she could hold him 
as a babe upon her bosom as she carried him down into Egypt. The time is 
prophesied already when he should go in his solitude up to the cross, and only 
leave his mother weeping at the foot. She is bidden to stand by and see her 
Son do his work and live his life, which thus far has been all of her shaping, in 
ways she cannot understand. No wonder that it is a clear, critical moment in 
her life. No wonder that her question still rings with the pain that she put into 
it. No wonder that when she went home, although he was still " subject unto 
her," her life with her son was all changed, and she " kept all these sayings 
in her heart." 

I think that this question of the mother of Jesus reveals an experience of 
the human heart which is very common, which is most common in the best 
hearts and those who feel their responsibility the most. It is an experience 
which well deserves our study, and I ask you this morning to think about it 



404 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

with me in some of its examples. The Virgin Mary is the perpetual type of 
people who, intrusted with any great and sacred interest, identify their own lives 
with that interest and care for it conscientiously ; but who, by-and-by, when the 
interest begins to manifest its own vitality and to shape its own methods, are 
filled with perplexity. They cannot keep the causes for which they labor under 
their own care. As his mother asked of Jesus, so they are always asking of the 
objects for which they live, " Why hast thou thus dealt with us? " Such people 
are people who have realized responsibility more than they have realized God. 
Just as Mary felt at the moment when she asked this question, that Jesus was 
her son more than that he was God's Son, so there is a constant tendency 
among the most earnest and conscientious people, to feel that the causes for 
which they live and work are their causes, more than that they are God's causes, 
and so to experience something which is almost like jealousy, when they see 
those causes pass beyond their power and fulfill themselves in larger ways than 
theirs. For such people, often the most devoted and faithful souls among us, 
it seems to me that there must be some help and light in this story of Jesus 
and his mother. 

The first and simplest case of the experience which I want to speak of, is 
that which comes nearest to the circumstances of our story. It comes in every 
childhood. It comes whenever a boy grows up to the time at which he passes 
beyond the merely parental government which belonged to his earliest years. 
It comes with all assertion of individual character and purpose in a boy's life. 
A boy has had his career all identified with his home where he was cradled. 
What he was and did, he was and did as a member of that household. But 
by-and-by there comes some sudden outbreak of a personal energy. He shows 
some disposition, and attempts some task distinctively his own. It is a puz- 
zling moment alike for the child and for the father. The child is perplexed with 
pleasure which is almost pain to find himself for the first time doing an act 
which is genuinely his own. The father is filled with a pain which yet has 
pride and pleasure in it to see his boy doing something original, something which 
he never bade him do, something which, perhaps, he could not do himself. 
The real understanding of that moment, both to child and father, depends upon 
one thing — upon whether they can see in it the larger truth that this child is not 
merely the son of his father, but also is the son of God. If they both under- 
stand that, then the child, as he undertakes his personal life, passes not into a 
looser, but into a stronger, responsibility. And the father is satisfied to see his 
first authority over his son grow less, because he cannot be jealous of God. It 
is a noble progress and expansion of life, when the first independent venture of 
a young man on a career of his own, is not the willful claim of the prodigal : 




Phillips Brooks, D.D, 



4o6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

" Give me the portion of goods that falleth to me," — but the reverent appeal of 
Jesus : " Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business ? " 

Let this serve for an illustration. It is the scene which, recurring m every 
household, as a boy claims his own life, is constantly repeating the experience 
of the household of Nazareth. And novv all responsible life, all life intrusted 
with the care of any of God's causes, has this same sort of correspondence 
with the life of the mother of Jesus. There can be no higher specimen of re- 
sponsibility than she exhibits. She is intrusted with the care of him who is to 
be the Saviour of the world. And that responsibility she accepts entirely. 
She is willing to give up everything else in life, to be absorbed and worn out 
in the task of supreme privilege which God has given her. There comes no 
trouble or lack in the degree of her readiness for labor or for pain. But the 
quality of her self-sacrifice shows its defect elsewhere. She is not able to see 
where the limits of her work must be. She is not able to stop short in her 
devout responsibility, when the task passes beyond her power, and her son 
begins to deal directly with his father. 

Compare with her, in the first place, that person with whom we are familiar 
in all the history of Christianity, whom we see about us constantly — the cham- 
pion of the Faith, the man who counts it his work in life to maintain and pro- 
tect the purity of the belief in Christ. It is a noble task for a man to accept. It 
is filled with anxiety. The faith for which the man cares is beset with many 
dangers. It costs him sleepless nights and weary days. He incurs dislike ; he 
excites hostility by his eager zeal. To all this he is fully equal. The danger of 
many a stout champion of truth comes quite at the other end. There comes a 
time when God, as it were, takes l)ack into his own keeping that faith over 
which he has bidden his disciples to stand guard. The truth begins to show a 
vitality upon which the believer has not counted. It puts itself into new forms. 
It develops new associations. No wonder that he is troubled. No wonder 
that, unless he is a large and thoughtful man. thoroughly reverent of truth as 
well as thoroughly devoted to the truths which he has held, he grudges truth in 
some way the larger freedom which it is claiming for itself, and almost opposes 
its development. 

Take an example. A good man has for years counted himself a champion 
of the often denied and insulted justice of God. He has been ready to main- 
tain it everywhere. Against all weak representations of God as a being all 
indulgence, he has asserted that God must punish wickedness. That truth he 
has supported, as he has conceived it. in its simplest, crudest form — physical, 
unending punishment. Suppose the day comes when that faith claims for itself a 
free and more spiritual meaning; when men's souls become aware that in the 



THE MOTHER'S WONDER. 407 

world to come, as in this world, the punishment of sin must be bound up in sin 
itself; when not the agonies of Hell, but the degradation of the moral nature, 
stands out as the dreadful thing. No wonder that at first, the surprised believer 
is almost dismayed. His faith, over which he has stood guard so faithfully, 
seems to be slipping away from him. His faith seems to be playing him false. 
He is bewildered, as Mary was when Jesus for the first time began to show his 
personal will and ways. But by-and-by the time came when she rejoiced in it, no 
doubt. " Whatsoever he saith unto you, do it," she ordered the servants at the 
marriage in Cana. By that time she had learned to trust her Son far out of her 
own sight, to look to his own self-development with perfect confidence. And 
so the believer, and the champion of belief, comes in the course of time to re- 
joice when his belief outgrows him ; when what he has to stand guard over is 
seen to be, not the special form in which a dogma has been conceived, but the 
spirit to which knowledge can come, and to which it must come always more 
spiritually and richly ; not the truth, but truthfulness. 

It does seem to me that this is what many a believer needs to learn to-day. 
His faith seems to be slipping away from him. Truths will not remain the 
definite and docile things they used to be. His doctrine opens into some deeper 
form. He turns to the doctrine he has held and says to it, " Why have you 
dealt thus with me?" "Why will you leave me?" And the answer is, "I 
must be about my. Father's business." Truth is God's child. Truth must be 
what God wills, not what the believer wills. It is a blessed day for the believer 
when he learns this, and thenceforth only waits to see what new forms God 
will give his faith from year to year, and then is ready to follow it into whatever 
new regions God will send it forth to seek. * * * 

Mary learned two things about her Son that day in the temple, things 
which she had known before, but which became perfectly and permanently clear 
to her there. One was, that his life, was mysteriously larger than her own. 
The other was, that God was over and behind her, caring for that life for which 
she had been caring. The largeness and mystery of her Son's life and the 
fatherhood of God to him, those two things she learned there, and thenceforth 
they were part of her life always. She never can have forgotten them again. 
They must have made all the future service that she rendered to him at once 
more faithful and more calm and more sacred. And my dear friend, you, too, 
must learn these truths about the life of any man whom, you are trying to help, 
any man who seems to be committed to you by God, or you cannot really help 
him as he needs. You must know the mystery of his life and his sonship to God. 

Ah, how God sometimes teaches us those things about some one whom we 
are trying to guide and aid. We have undertaken our task very flippantly and 



4o8 MASTERPIECES OR AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

narrowly. " Well, this is my man," we say, " I do not see who else can help 
him, and so I will. I will patronize him. I understand him ; I see what is to be 
made out of him; I will make him this, and this," — laying some fine plan down 
in our mind. " This is what he shall be," and so you take your scholar into your 
school ; your companion into your company ; what you call your friend into what 
you call your friendship. The time must come, if you are ever really going to 
be of deepest use to that man, when, out of something which he says or does, 
these two truths come to you about him, that he is larger in his nature, more 
mysterious than you can grasp, and that he is the son of God, led by his Father, 
over and above your care. * * * 

But we must not stop here. There is a yet deeper and closer care laid 
upon a man than his care for his brother, and that is the care of himself, of his 
own soul. And there too the truth applies which we have won out of our story 
of Jesus and his mother. There too it is true that a man cannot execute his 
responsibility aright unless in that for which he is responsible he sees something 
m)sterious, and a child of God. 

A man's care for himself ! How strange it is ! How a man seems to separate 
his life; to stand off, as it were, and gaze at his own life with criticism and 
anxiety. It is the commonest of all experiences with all thoughtful people. 
" Know thyself," says the old proverb ; as if the knower and the known were 
genuinely two, distinct from one another. " Keep thy heart with diligence " 
says Scripture, as if the heart and the heartkeeper were separate. The will and 
wisdom stand guard over the conscience and the character. 

A man who is really thoughtful, who has risen to the capacity of such self- 
care, praises himself, and blames himself, with a more even-handed justice be- 
cause with a more intimate and conscientious knowledge, than that with which 
he judges of the lives of other men. He is to himself like something outside of 
himself with whose conditions nevertheless all his own fortunes are inextricably 
bound up. Therefore he lays out plans for his own treatment. He says : " I 
will make myself this or that." He says, " I will bring myself to my best in 
this or that way." And then, as he tries to carry out his plans, he becomes 
aware that on this self of his which he considered so entirely his own, in his own 
power, some other force besides his own is working. He finds himself the 
subject of some other will and wisdom, some other education than his own. His 
plans for his own life are overruled and interfered with. He meant to educate 
his self by self-indulgence ; this other force, below his own, sweeps his self off 
into distress and deprivation. He meant to live in self-complacency ; the deeper 
force plunges him into mortification and shame. It is as if the wind thought that 
it was ruling the waves which it tossed to and fro, but gradually became aware 



THE MOTHER'S WONDER. 409 

of the tide which underneath was heaving the great ocean on whose surface 
only the wind spent its force. 

Is this a true picture of human hfe as the thoughtful man comes to know 
it ? 1 think it is. Who is there of us that is not aware that his soul has had two 
educations ? Sometimes the two have been in opposition ; sometimes they have 
overlapped ; sometimes they have wholly coincided ; but always the two have 
been two. Our own government of ourselves is most evident, is the one which 
we are most aware of, so that sometimes for a few moments we forget that there 
is any other ; but very soon our plans for ourselves are so turned and altered 
and hindered that we cannot ignore the other greater, deeper force. We meant 
to do that, and look ! we have been led on to this. We meant to be this, and lo '. 
wc are that. We never meant to believe this, and lo, we hold it with all our 
hearts. What does it mean ? It is the everlasting discovery, the discovery which 
each thoughtful man makes for himself with almost as much surprise as if no 
other man had ever made it for himself before, that this soul, for which he is 
responsible, is not his soul only, but is God's soul too. The revelation which 
came of old to the Virgin Mother about her child — not your child only, but 
God's child too ; yours, genuinely, really yours, but behind yours, and over 
yours, God's. 

That is the great revelation about life. When it comes, everything about 
one's self-culture is altered. Every anticipation and thought of living changes 
its color. It comes sometimes early, and sometimes late in life. Sometimes it 
is the flush and glow which fills childhood with dewy hope and beauty. Some- 
times it is the peace which gathers about old age and makes it happy. When- 
ever it comes it makes life new. See what the changes are which it must bring. 
First it makes anything like a bewildering surprise impossible. When I have 
once taken it into my account that God has his plans for my soul's culture, that 
these plans of his outgo and supersede any plans for it which I can make, then 
any new turn that comes is explicable to me, and, though I may not have 
anticipated it all, I am not overwhelmed, nor disturbed, nor dismayed bv it. I 
find a new conviction growing in my soul, another view of life, another kind of 
faith. It is not what I had intended. I had determined that as long as I lived, 
I would believe something very dilTerent from this which I now feel rising and 
taking possession of me. It seems at first as if my soul had been disloyal to me, 
and had turned its back faithlessly upon my teaching. I appeal to it, and say: 
" Soul, why hast thou thus dealt with me ? " And it answers back to me : 
" Wist you not, that I must be about my Father's business ? Did you not know 
that I was God's soul as well as your soul? This is something which he has 
taught me." 

(Being part of a sermon.) 




410 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Finger of God. 

By Rev. T. DeWlTT TALMAQE, of New Jersey. 

Exodus, 8:19: '■ The fingvjr of God." 
(Born 1832.) 



HARAOH was sulking in his marble throne room at IMemphis. Plague 
after plague had come, and sometimes the Egyptian monarch was dis- 
posed to do better, but at the lifting of each plague, he was as bad as 
before. The necromancers of the palace, however, were compelled to 
recognize the divine movement, and after one of the most exasperating 
plagues of all the series, they cried out in the words of my text : " This 
is the finder of God," not the first nor the last time when bad people said a good 
thing. An old Philadelphia friend visiting me the other day, asked me if I had 
ever noticed the passage of Scripture from which I to-day speak. I told him 
no, and I said right away, " That is a good text for a sermon." In strange way 
sometimes God suggests to his servants useful discourse. It would be a great 
book that would give the history of sermons. 

We all recognize the hand of God, and know it is a mighty hand. You 
have seen a man keep two or three rubber balls flying in the air, catching and 
pitching them so that none of them fell to the floor, and do this for several 
minutes, and you have admired his dexterity ; but have you thought how the 
hand of God keeps thousands and thousands of round worlds vastly larger than 
our world flying for centuries without letting one fall? Wondrous power and 
skill of God's hand! But al)out that 1 am not to discourse. My text leads me 
to speak of less than a fifth of the divine hand. " This is the finger of God." 
Only in two other places does the Bible refer to this division of the Omnipotent 
hand. The rocks on Mount Sinai are basalt and very hard stone. Do you 
imagine it was a chisel that cut the ten commandments in that basalt ? No, in 
Exodus we read that the tables of stone were '" written with the finger of God." 
Christ says that he cast out devils with " the finger of God." The only instance 
that Christ wrote a word, he wrote not with a pen on parchment, but with his 
finger on the ground. Yet, though so seldom reference is made in the Bible to 
a part of God's hand, if you and I keep our eyes open and our heart right, we 
will be compelled often to cry out, " This is the finger of God." 




Rev. T. DeWitt Talmage, 



412 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

To most of us gesticulation is natural. If a stranger accost you on the street 
and ask you the way to some place, it is as natural as to breathe for you to 
level your forefinger this way or that. Not one out of a thousand of you 
would stand with your hands by your side and make no motion with your finger. 
Whatever you may say with your lips is emphasized and reinforced and trans- 
lated by your finger. Now, God, in the dear old Book, says to us innumerable 
things by the way of direction. He plainly tells us the way to go. But in every 
exigency of our life, if we will only look, we will find a providential gesture and 
a providential pointing, so that we may confidently say, " This is the finger 
of God." Two or three times in my life when perplexed on questions of duty 
after earnest prayer I have cast lots as to what I should do. In olden times 
the Lord's people cast lots. The land of Canaan was divided by lot ; the cities 
were divided among the priests and Levites by lot ; Matthias was chosen to the 
apostleship by lot. Now, casting lots is about the most solemn thing you can 
do. It should never be done except with solemnity, like that of the last judg- 
ment. It is a direct appeal to the Almighty. If, after earnest prayer, you do 
not seem to get the divine direction, I think you might, without sin, write upon 
one slip of paper " Yes " and upon another " No," or some other words appro- 
priate to the case, and then obliterating from your mind the identity of the 
slips of paper, draw the decision and act upon it. In that case I think you 
have a right to take that indication as the finger of God. But do not do that 
except as the last resort, and with a devoutness that leaves absolutely all with 
God. 

For much that concerns us we have no responsibility, and we need not 
make appeal to the Lord for direction. We are not responsible for most of our 
surroundings ; we are not responsible for the country of our birth, nor for 
whether we are Americans or Norwegians or Scotchmen or Irishmen or English- 
men ; we are not responsible for our temperament, be it nervous or phlegmatic, 
bilious or sanguine; we are not responsible for our features, be they homely or 
beautiful ; we are not responsible for the height or smallness of our stature ; we 
are not responsible for the fact that we are mentally dull or brilliant. For the 
most of our environments, we have no more responsibility than we have for 
the mollusks at the botton of the Atlantic ocean. I am very glad that there 
are many things that we are not responsible for. Do not blame one for being 
in his manner as cold as an iceberg or nervous as a cat amid a pack of Fourth 
of July crackers. If you are determined to blame somebody, blame our great- 
grandfathers, or our great-grandmothers, who died before the Revolutionary 
War, and who may have had habits depressing and ruinous. There are 
wrong things about all of us, which make me think that one hundred and fifty 



THE FINGER OF GOD. 413 

years ago there was some terrible crank in our ancestral line. Realize that and 
it will be a relief, semi-infinite. Let us take ourselves as we are at this moment, 
and then ask, " Which way ? " Get all the direction you can from careful and 
constant study of the Bible, and then look up and look out and look around, and 
see if you can find the finger of God. 

It is a remarkable thing that sometimes no one can see that finger but your- 
self. A year before Abraham Lincoln signed the Proclamation of Emancipa- 
tion, the White House was thronged with committees and associations, ministers 
and laymen, advising the President to make that Proclamation. But he waited 
and waited, amid scoff and anathema, because he did not himself see the finger 
of God. After awhile, and at just the right time, he saw the divine pointing 
and signed the Proclamation. The distinguished Confederates, Mason and 
Slidell, were taken off an English vessel by the United States Government. 
" Don't give them up," shouted all the Northern States. " Let us have war 
with England rather than surrender them," was the almost unanimous cry of 
the North. But William H. Seward saw the finger of God leading in just the 
opposite direction, and the Confederates were given up, and we avoided a war 
with England, which at that time would have been the demolition of the United 
States Government. In other words, the finger of God, as it directs you, may 
be invisible to everybody else. Follow the divine pointing, as you see it, al- 
though the world may call you a fool. There has never been a man or woman 
who amounted to anything that has not sometimes been called a fool. Nearly 
all the mistakes that you and I have made have come from our following the 
pointing of some other finger, instead of the finger of God. But, now, suppose 
all forms of disaster close in upon a man. Suppose his business collapses. Sup- 
pose he buys goods and cannot sell them. There are men of vast wealth who 
are as rich for Heaven as they are for this world, but they are exceptions. If a 
man grows in grace, it is generally before he gets one hundred thousand dollars, 
or after he loses them. If a man has plenty of railroad securities and has ap- 
plied to his banker for more; if the lots he bought have gone up fifty per cent, 
in value ; if he had hard work to get the door of his fireproof safe shut because 
of the new roll of securities he put in there just before locking up at night ; if he 
be speculating in a falling market, or a rising market, and things take for him 
a right turn, he does not grow in grace very much that week. Suppose a cold 
spring or a late autumn or the coming of an epidemic corners a man, and his 
notes come due and he cannot meet them, and his rent must be paid, 
and there is nothing with which to pay it, and the wages of the employees are 
due and there is nothing with which to meet that obligation, and 
the bank will not discount, and the business friends to whom he goes 



414 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

for accommodation are in the same predicament, and he bears up and 
struggles on, until, after a while, crash goes the whole concern. He stands 
wondering and saying : " I do not see the meaning of all this ; I have done the 
best I could. God knows I would pay my debts if I could, but here I am hedged 
in and stopped." What should thi^t man do in that case? Go to the Scriptures 
and read the promise about all things working together for good, and kindred 
passages? That is well. But he needs to do something besides reading the 
Scriptures. He needs to look for the finger of God that is pointing toward 
better treasures ; that is pointing toward eternal release ; that is urging him to 
higher realms. No human finger ever pointed to the East or West or North or 
South so certainly as the finger of God is pointing that troubled man to higher 
and better spiritual resources than he ever enjoyed. I am speaking of whole- 
souled men. Such men are so broken by calamity that they are humbled and 
fly to God for relief. Men who have no spirit and never expect anything are not 
much affected by financial changes. They are as apt to go into the kingdom 
under one set of circumstances as another. They are dead beats wherever they 
are. The only way to get rid of them is to lend them a dollar, and you will 
never see them again. I have tried that plan and it works well. But I am 
speaking of the efifects of misfortune on high-spirited men. Nothing but trial 
will turn such men from earth to Heaven. 

Do you know what made the great revival of 1857, when more people were 
converted to God, proliably, than in any year since Christ was born? It was 
the defalcations and bankruptcies which swept American prosperity so flat that 
it could fall no flatter. It is only through clouds and darkness and whirlwind of 
disaster such men can see the finger of God. 

A most interesting, as well as a most useful, study is to watch the 
pointing of the finger of God. In the seventeenth century, South Carolina was 
yielding resin and turpentine and tar as her chief productions. But Thomas 
Smith noticed that the ground near his house in Charleston was very much 
like the places in Aladagascar where he had raised rice, and some of the 
Madagascar rice was sown there and grew so rapidly that South Carolina was 
led to make rice her chief production. Can \ou not see the finger of God in 
that incident? Rev. John Fletcher, of England, many will know, was one of 
the most useful ministers of the Gospel who ever preached. Before conversion 
he joined the Army and had bought his ticket on the ship for South America. 
The morning he was to sail someone spilled on him a kettle of hot water, and 
he was so scalded he could not go. He was very much disappointed, but the 
ship he was going to sail on went out and was never heard of again. Who 
can doubt that God was arranging the life of John Fletcher? Was it merely 



THE FINGER OF GrOD. 415 

accident that Richard Rodda, a Cornish miner, who was on his knees praying, 
remained unhurt, though heavy stones fell before him and behind him and on 
each side of him, and another fell on top of these so as to make a roof over 
him? F. W. Robertson, the great preacher of Brighton. England, had his 
life-work decided by the barking of his dog. A neighbor, whose daughter was 
ill. was disturbed by the barking of that dog one night. This brought the neigh- 
bor into communication with Robertson. That acquaintanceship kept him from 
joining the dragoons, and going to India and spending his life in military ser- 
vice, and reserved him for a pulpit, the influence of which, for Gospelization, will 
resound for all time and all eternity. Why did not Columbus sink when, in early 
m'anhood, he was afloat six miles from the beach with nothing to sustain him 
till he could swim to land but a boat's oar? I wonder if his preservation had any- 
thing to do with America? Had the storm that diverted The Mayfiozvcr from 
the mouth of the Hudson, for which it was sailing, and sent it ashore at Cape Cod. 
no divine supervisal? Does anarchy rule this world, or God? 

St. Felix escaped martyrdom by crawling through a hole in the wall across 
which the spiders immediately afterward wove a web. His persecutors saw the 
hole in the wall, but the spider's web put them off the track. A boy was lost 
by his drunken father, and could not for years find his way home. Nearly 
grown, he went into a Fulton street prayer-meeting and asked for prayers 
that he might find his parents. His mother was in the room, and rose, and 
recognized her long-lost son. Do you say that these things " only happened 
so ? " Tell tliat to those who do not believe in a God and have no faith in the 
Bible. Do not tell it to me. I said to an aged minister of much experience, 
" All the events of my life seem to have been' divinely connected. Do you sup- 
pose it is so in all lives?" He answered, "Yes, but most people do not 
notice the divine leadings." I stand here to say from my own experience that 
the safest thing in all the world to do is to trust the Lord. I never had a mis- 
fortune, or a persecution, or a trial, or a disappointment, however excruciating 
at the time, that God did not make turn out for my good. My one wish is to 
follow the divine leading. I want to watch the finger of God. 

But notice that this finger of God, almost always and in almost everything, 
points forward, and not backward. All the way through the Bible, the lamb and 
pigeon on the altar, the pillar of fire poised above the wilderness, peace offering, 
sin offering, trespass offering, fingers of Joseph and Isaac and Joshua and David 
and Isaiah and Micah and Ezekiel, all together made the one finger of God 
pointing to the human, the divine, the gracious, the glorious, the omnipotent, 
the gentle, the pardoning and suffering and atoning Christ. And now the same 
finger of God is pointing the world upward to the same Redeemer and forward 



4i6 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

to the time of his universal domination. My hearers, get out of the habit of 
looking back and looking down and look up and look forward. It is useful 
once in awhile to look back, but you had better, for the most part of the time, 
stop reminiscence and begin anticipation. We have, most of us, hardly begun 
yet. If we love the Lord and trust him — and you may all love him and trust 
him from this moment on — we no more understand the good things ahead of 
us than a child at school studying his ABC can understand what that has to 
do with his reading John Ruskin's " Seven Lamps of Architecture," or Dante's 
" Divina Commedia." The satisfactions and joys we have as yet had are like 
the music a boy makes with his first lesson on the violin compared with what 
was evoked from his great orchestra by my dear and illustrious and transcendent, 
but now departed friend, Patrick Gilmore, when he lifted his baton and all the 
strings vibrated, and all the trumpets pealed forth, and all the flutes caroled, 
and all the drums rolled, and all the hoofs of the cavalry charge, which he 
imitated, were in full beat. Look ahead ! The finger of God points forward. 

My friends, I do not know how we are going to stand it — I mean the full 
inrush of that splendor. Last summer I saw Moscow, in some respects the 
most splendid city under the sun. Tlie Emperor afterward asked me if I had 
seen it, for Moscow is the pride of Russia. I told him yes, and that I had seen 
Moscow burn. I will tell you what I meant. After examining nine hundred 
brass cannons which were picked out of the snow after Napoleon retreated from 
Moscow, each cannon deep cut with the letter " N," I ascended a tower of some 
two hundred and fifty feet, just before sunset, and on each platform there were 
bells, large and small, and I climbed up among the bells, and then as I reached 
the top, all the bells underneath me began to ring, and they were joined by the 
bells of fourteen hundred towers and domes and turrets. Some of the bells 
sent out a faint tinkle of sound, a sweet tintinnabulation that seemed a bubbling 
of the air, and others thundered forth boom after boom, boom after boom, 
until it seemed to shake the earth and fill the heavens — sounds so weird, so 
sweet, so awful, so grand, so charming, so tremendous, so soft, so rippling, so 
reverberating — and they seemed to wreathe and whirl and rise and sink and 
burst and roll and mount and die. When Napoleon saw Moscow burn, it 
could not have been more brilliant than when I saw the fourteen hundred tur- 
rets aflame with the sunset; and there were roofs of gold, and walls of mala- 
chite, and pillars of porphyry, and balustrades of mosaic, and architecture of all 
colors mingling the brown of autumnal forests and the blue of summer heavens, 
and the conflagration of morning skies, and the emerald of rich grass, and the 
foam of tossing seas. The mingling of so many sounds was an entra-ncement 
almost too much for human nerves and human eyes and human ears. I expect 



THE FINGER OF GOD. 



41;^ 



to see nothing to equal it until you and I see Heaven. But that will surpass it 
and make the memory of what I saw that July evening in Moscow almost tame 
and insipid. All Heaven aglow and all Heaven a-ring, not in the sunset, but in 
the sunrise. Voices of our own kindred mingling with the doxologies of empires. 
Organs of eternal worship responding to the trumpets that have wakened the 
dead. Nations in white. Centuries in coronation. Anthems like the voice of 
many waters. Circle of martyrs. Circle of apostles. Circle of prophets. 
Thrones of cherubim. Thrones of seraphim. Throne of archangel. Throne of 
Christ. Throne of God. Thrones ! Thrones ! Thrones ! The finger of God 
points that way. Stop not until you reach that place. Through the atoning 
Christ, all I speak of and more may be yours and mine. Do you not now hear 
the chime of the bells of that metropolis of the universe? Do you not see the 
shimmering of the towers ? Good morning. 

(Being part of a sermon.) 





4i8 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Sowing and Reaping. 

By JOHN B. QOUQH, of Pennsylvania. 

(Born 1817. died 1886.) 



NE favorite argument of young men in reference to the use of intoxi- 
cating drink is, " When I find out that it is doing me an injury, then I 
will give it up." That is making an admission and coming to a con- 
clusion. The admission is true; the conclusion is false. You admit 
it may injure you, and when it Jias — no; there would be some sense 
in that; but when you fiiid out that it has injured you, then you will 
quit it. You won't use such an argument in reference to any other matter. " I 
will put my hand into the den of a rattlesnake, and when / find out that he has 
stuck his fangs into me I will draw it out and get it cured as quickly as pos- 
sible." There is no common sense in that. 

Young men, beware of this thing, because it is a snare. It is fearfully 
deceptive. Every man who drinks intends to be a moderate drinker. I have 
said this over and over again, because I believe it to be important. Every man 
who becomes intemperate does so by a course of argument from the beginning 
all the way down to ruin. Young men, you say, " When I find out that it is 
injuring inc, then I zcill gii'e it up.'' Is that sensible? 

I once heard of a pilot who said he could pilot a vessel into Boston harbor. 
" Now," said the captain. " I'll stand "midshii)s, and you can take the helm. 
I know every rock in this channel — every one of 'em — I know 'm all and I'll 
give you warning." By and by the vessel struck upon a rock, and the shock 
threw everybody down upon the deck. The poor pilot got up, rubbing himself, 
and said, " Captain, there's one of 'em." 

Now. we say to young men, " There's one of them. Hard up your helm 
before you strike ! " That is sensible. If you have struck, haul off and repair 
damages, and then strike again. Is that sensible? In time the poor old bat- 
tered hulk will not bear any more damages, and men will bury you, a broken 
wreck. That is the end of it, in many cases. " When I find out that it^is injuring 
me, then I zvill give it up." Gather all the drunkards of this country together, 
and ask them, every one, "Are yon drinking enough to injure you?'' A large 




John B. Gough. 



420 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

proportion will declare that they are not. Each one of them has become a 
drunkard in the sight of God and man before he has become one in his own 
estimation. 

Intoxicating drink is deceptive in its very nature. It reminds me of the 
fable of the serpent in a circle of fire. A man was passing by, and the snake 
said to him, " Help me out of my difficulty." " If I do, you'll bite me." " Oh, 
no, I won't." " I'm afraid to trust you." " Help me out of the fire, or it will 
consume me, and I promise on my word of honor I won't bite you." The man 
look the snake out of the fire, and threw it on the ground. Instantly the ser- 
pent said, " Now I'll bite you." " But didn't you promise me you wouldn't? " 
" Yes ; but don't you know it's my nature to bite, and I cannot help it." So it is 
with the drink. It is its nature to bite ; it is its nature to deceive. 

Young men say (and I have heard them more than once) that they " must 
sow their wild oats." Remember this, young gentlemen, " Whatsoever a man 
soweth, that shall he also reap." If you sow corn, you reap corn. If you sow 
weeds, you reap weeds. If you sow to the flesh, you will of the flesh reap 
corruption. But if you sow to the spirit, you will of the spirit reap life ever- 
lasting. Ah, young men, look at tJiat reaping, and then contemplate the awful 
reaping of men to-day who are reaping as they have sown, in bitterness of 
spirit and anguish of soul. " When I find out that it is injuring me, tiie.v / will 
giz'e it tip.'' 

Surely, that is not common sense. Such is the fascination thrown around 
a man by the power of this habit, that it must have essentially injured liim 
before he will acknowledge the hurt and consent to give it up. Many a man 
has been struck down in his prosperity, has been sent to prison for crime, before 
he acknowledged that his evil habit was injuring him. I remember riding from 
Buffalo to Niagara Falls, and I said to a gentleman, " What river is that, sir? " 
" That," he said, " is Niagara river." " It is a beautiful stream," said I, " bright, 
smooth, and glassy; how far off are the rapids?" "Only a few miles," was 
the reply. " Is it possil)le that only a few miles from us we shall find the water 
in the turbulence which it nuist show when near the rapids? " " You will find 
it so, sir." And so I found it, and that first sight of Niagara Falls I shall never 
forget. Now, launch your bark on that river ; the water is smooth, beautiful, 
and glassy. There is a ripple at the bow of your boat, and the silvery wake it 
leaves behind adds to your enjoyment. You set out on your pleasure excursion. 
Down the stream you glide; oars, sails, and helm in proper trim. Suddenly 
someone cries out from the bank, "Young men, ahoy!" "What is it?" 
" The rapids are below you." " Ha, ha! we have heard of the rapids, but we are 
not such fools as to jret into them. When we find we are going too fast, then 



SOWING AND REAPING. 421 

we shall up with the helm and steer for the shore ; we will set the mast in the 
socket, hoist the sail, and speed to land. Then on, boys, don't be alarmed ; 
there's no danger." "Young men, ahoy there!" "What is it?" "The 
rapids are below you." "Ha, ha! we will laugh and quaff; all things delight 
us. What care we for the future? No man ever saw it. Sufficient for the 
day is the evil thereof. We will enjoy life while we may ; we will catch pleasure 
as it fiies. This is enjoyment ; time enough to steer out of danger when we are 
sailing too swiftly with the current." "Young men, ahoy!" "What is it?" 
' Beware, beware ! the rapids are below you." Now you feel them ! See the 
water foaming all around ! See how fast you pass that point ! Up with the 
helm! Now turn! Pull hard; quick, quick! Pull for your lives! Pull till 
the blood starts from the nostrils and the veins stand like whipcord upon the 
brow. Set the mast in the socket; hoist the sail! Ah, ah, it is too late; faster 
and faster you near the awful cataract, and then, shrieking, cursing, howling, 
praying, over you go. Thousands launch their barks in smooth water and 
realize no danger till on the verge of ruin, boasting all the while to the last, 
■ When I find out that it is injuring me, then I will give it up." The power of 
this habit, I repeat, is fascinating, is deceptive, and men may go on arguing 
and coming to conclusions while on the way down to destruction. 

People do not act with common sense in this matter as they do in others. 
I read of a Yankee who went into an apothecary's shop in Boston. 

"Be you a drugger?" he asked. 

" I am an apothecary, and I sell drugs." 

" Well, have you got any of this 'ere scentin' stuff that gals put on their 
handkerchiefs ? " 

" Yes ; I have." 

" Well, my sister Sal gave me ninepence. and told me to invest the whole 
amount in jest sich truck if I could get anything to suit ; and I should like to 
smell round if you have no objection." 

" Certainly not," said the chemist, " here is some essence of peppermint." 

" O, that's royal," said the man. 

" Here is some essence of lemon." 

" That^s royaller." 

At last the apothecary took some strong spirits of hartshorn. " This," said 
he, " is a very subtle essence, and if you want to get the full virtue of it, the 
pure scent, you must draw in as hard as you can ; a simple sniff will do no good." 

" Hold on a minute," said the man, " till I git ready, and when I say, ' Now,' 
you let her rip." Then he shouted, " Now," and over he went. What did he 
do? Did he get up and smell again? No; he had too much common sense; 



422 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



as soon as he got on his feet he squared his arms and began to show fight, 
saying, " If you make me smell that 'tarnal everlastin' stufif again, I'll make you 
smell fire and brimstone." There was some common sense in that. Yet, in 
the matter of drinking, men go up to their old enemy and he knocks them 
over ; up they get, and over they go again ; and so it continues until they have 
hardly strength enough to get down on their hands and knees to kiss the foot 
of their foe, who with the next spurn sends the poor shrieking spirit into eternity, 
infatuated by the influence of drink. Yet men boast that they will not " sign 
away their privileges." 

To return for a minute to the argument, " I can let it alone when I please." 
Suppose I lie upon the railway track ; someone cries out to me, " Get up, get 
up; the train is coming." " You mind your own business; I'm not fool enough 
to be run over, am I? I can get up when I've .a mind to, and I can lie here 
as long as I please, can't I ? " I boast of a power I positively possess, but I 
have no will to exercise the power, and the train comes thundering on and 
cuts me in two. What am I? I am a self-nmrderer. I had the ])ower; I had 
the warning ; I refused to exercise this power ; and, when swift destruction came, 
the power was taken from me. Every man that dies a drunkard dies a suicide. 
He had the power to escape, and he had the warning ; there is not a man who 
dares to say, "I have had no warning." Stop one moment; stop and listen; 
}ou can hear the shrieks that come up from the vortex, — shrieks, piercing 
shrieks of despair from those who are sinking to rise no more. Your whole 
way is lined with spectres that are pointing to the future of those who heedlessly 
argue their way down the fatal sliding scale. Therefore, every man who dies a 
drunkard, dies a suicide. * * * 

(Being part of a temperance address.) 





THE MODERATE DRINKER. 423 



The Moderate Drinker. 

By JOHN B. QOUQH, of Pennsylvania. 

(Born 1817, died 1886.) 



^O moderate drinkers we appeal for help. We do not abuse you. We 
do not tell you that you are worse than the drunkard, and all that sort 
of thing ; and we do not desire to deprive you of a gratification with no 
reason but our own whim. But we can ask you to give it up, making 
no demand upon you except in the name of our common humanity. 
But some persons find fault with us, and tell us we are unjust in 
endeavoring to deprive moderate drinkers of that which is a lawful gratification. 
A lady friend of mine, who never offers wine, gave a dinner-party at which 
were some literary gentlemen. One LL.D. said to her, " Mrs. So-and-so, I 
think you do me, and such as I am, an injustice." " How so? " "Well, you 
know I drink a glass of wine at my dinner. I am accustomed to it. I don't 
thmk it ever hurt me. It does me good. I am fond of it. You say to me when 
I come to your house, ' Now, doctor, I shall give you no wine, because a bad 
use is made of it by some, and here is a person who, if he drinks it, injures him- 
self.' You take from me an innocent gratification, at the least, and that which 
I am used to, and which I miss if I do not obtain, because somebody makes a 
fool of himself; and because somebody can't drink without being injured, you 
say I shall have none. Now is that fair? By-and-by you will take from us 
all our little luxuries, and there is no knowing where these encroachments will 
end. Now I like a little bit of cheese after my dinner; I think it promotes 
digestion. Now suppose you say, ' Doctor, here is a man who cannot eat cheese 
with impunity ; I shall give you no cheese ; I will not give a particle of cheese 
to my guests, because some people eat cheese to their detriment.' Is that fair? " 
I ask any intelligent person if that is a fair way of putting it? Did you 
ever hear of a man on the scaffold, about to be hung, saying to those who came 
to witness this execution, "Take warning by me, and, never eat cheese?" Did 
you ever hear of a man murdering his wife, and giving as his excuse that he had, 
been eating cheese? W^as there ever a row in the streets, ribs broken, and blood 
shed, which the newspapers next morning stated was because these men had 



424 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

been eating cheese? Did you ever hear a mother mourn over the dead body of 
her child, crying, " Would I had died for thee, O, my son ! I have no hope in 
his death; he died from eating cheese? "" All I have to say is just this: Prove 
to me that the use of cheese produces the same results as does the use of drink, 
and, by the grace of God, I will fight the cheese as heartily as I do the drink. 
I consider it the height of stupidity and nonsense to bring such an argument as 
that against us while we are advocating the disuse of intoxicating liquor as a 
beverage. We do not seek to take it away from you by force ; we want you 
to be made so far acquainted with the evils of drink that, with your heart and 
soul, and in the exercise of large-hearted, self-denying benevolence, you will 
give it up for the sake of others. That is the grand principle on which we base 
our appeal, and it is the highest principle. 

Some say, however. " You will certainly let us have a little as a medicine." 
Yes, certainly we will ; we do not condemn it as a medicine ; that is, when men 
really take it as such. I was once at a dinner-party when a gentleman at table, 
holding a glass in his hand, said to a lady present, " I assure your ladyship I 
am personally an abstainer, and am opposed" — and he swallowed the wine — 
" to the drinking usages of society ; but I take wine by the prescription of my 
medical man." I thought I would see how nuich medicine he took, and before 
the meat was brought on he drank three glasses of sherry. 1 did not wonder, 
then, that people lay in their medicine a pipe at a time, or by so many dozen 
bottles. I believe a great deal of this medicine-taking is rank, sheer hypocrisy. 
It may not be in your case, but. I believe it is in the majority of cases. 
I A gentleman said to me, '"Ah, if you go on the continent you ought, at 
your age, to take a little wine — the water is doubtful." They told me so when 
I went to California ; and they told me so when I went to Montreal. I said, " I 
don't think I need it." " But I think you do." " Well, look at me. I am 
sixty-one years of age. I have delivered seven thousand eight hundred ad- 
dresses on the subject of temperance, and on other topics. I have traveled four 
hundred and twenty thousand miles, and I have not been in bed a whole day 
from illness since 1846." That is how I have managed on cold water without 
the aid of stimulants. I think there are some doctors who prescribe wine because 
they like to take a little medicine with their patients when they call. I think 
some prescribe it because they believe it to be necessary, and I rather guess 
that the physician who prescribed it for a very dear friend of mine was one of 
that sort. When my friend was in London, he consulted a physician, who said, 
" You ought to take a little champagne." " Why? " he asked. " Well, you are 
very tall, and you are very bald, and the top of your head is necessarily cold, 
and you need some stimulants to send the blood over the top of your head." I 



THE MODERATE DRINKER. 425 

suppose he believed it to be necessary. Some prescribe it because they do not 
know anything about it. * * * 

"Ah, but," say some, " there is enjoyment and gratification in it." So there 
is ; I have experienced that myself. I have felt it thrilling to the tips of my 
fingers with a new, strange, delightfully exhilarating sensation. I have been in 
a clubroom when the wine has passed from one to the other, and we have felt 
ourselves great men presently, with plenty of money in our pockets when we 
really had hardly enough to pay our board-bill. 

One man said to another, " Look here, if you want to borrow a thousand 
dollars in your business, come down to my office and I shall be very happy to 
lend it you." The man thought he could use a thousand dollars admirably, and 
he went to his friend the next morning and said, " You told me if I came to 
your office, you could let me have a thousand dollars to use in my business." 
" Did I? " " Yes." " Well, I haven't got it now, but I may have it by night." 
I heard once of a man who, in a wretched, dilapidated condition, was looking at 
the launch of a ship. Some of the owners held a consultation, and thought the 
ship had better remain on the stocks two or three days longer. One of them 
said, " I should be unwilling to take the responsibility of it." This poor, miser- 
able fellow came up, with his trousers shining with old age, boots broken, and 
hat battered, and said : " Let her slide, / will take the responsibility." Yes, there 
is a gratification, an exhilaration, an excitement produced by the drink. Any 
mistakes in the Cabinet, send for one of us ; we will reconcile all questions to 
the satisfaction of all parties, foreign nations included. When we were half 
drunk, beautiful visions passed before us, and we only wanted the canvas and 
the pencil to immortalize ourselves. There is a gratification in drinking. What 
is it? It is the gratification of intoxication. 

Men talk about enjoyment in drinking ! There is really none. It is merely 
momentary and imaginary. No man ever received satisfaction enough in wicked* 
pursuits to say, "Ah, now I am happy! " It is gone from him. All the enjoy- 
ments that can be obtained in this world, apart from the enjoyments God has 
sanctioned, lead to destruction. It is as if a man should start in a chase after a 
bubble, attracted by its bright and gorgeous hues. It leads him through vine- 
yards, under trelHsed vines with grapes hanging in all their purpled glory: it 
leads him past sparkling fountains, amid the music of singing birds ; it leads him 
through orchards hanging thick with golden fruit. He laughs and dances. It 
is a merry chase. By and by that excitement becomes intense, that intensity 
becomes a passion, that passion a disease. Now his eye is fixed upon the bubble 
with fretful earnestness. Now he leaps with desperation and disappointment. 
Now it leads him away from all that is bright and beautiful, from all the tender, 



426 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

clustering, hallowed associations of bygone days, up the steep hot sides of a 
fearful volcano. Now there is pain and anguish in the chase. He leaps and 
falls, and rises, bruised, scorched, and blistered ; but the excitement has the 
mastery over him ; he forgets all that is past, and in his terrible chase he leaps 
again. It is gone ! He curses, and bites his lips in agony, and shrieks almost 
the wild shriek of despair. Yet still he pursues his prize. He must secure it. 
Knee-deep in the hot ashes, he falls, then up again with limbs torn and bruised, 
the last semblance of humanity scorched out of him. Yet there is his prize! He 
will have it. With one desperate effort he makes a sudden leap. Ah, he has it 
now ; but he has leaped into the volcano, and, with a burst bubble in his hand, 
goes to his retribution. Heaven pity every man who follows, and is fascinated 
by, an enjoyment God has not sanctioned. The result of all God's good gifts to 
him is a burst bubble ! An Indian chief bartered away costly diamonds for a 
few glass beads and a plated button. Young men are every day bartering away 
jewels worth all the kingdoms of the earth for less than a plated button, for that 
which vanishes in their eager grasp. 

Enjoyment ! We have wonderful capacities for enjoyment and wonderful 
sources of enjoyment. But I have come to this conclusion, young men, that 
there is no enjoyment worth having for which you cannot thank God. None! 
And if you can get drunk, and then thank God for it the next morning, then I 
have nothing more to say to you. We have sources of enjoyment all around us 
and beneath us and above us and ever\'where. I remember a lady asking me 
once, in Cincinnati, if I would go and hear Werner play. Now I am exceedingly 
fond of music, and he is an admirable musician. We went to his room, and he 
said he wovild play for me on Wednesday afternoon as long as I chose to listen. 
O, those wild, weird, wailing discords of Chopin, resolved into such wonderful 
harmony! All I could say was, like Oliver Twist, " More, more," and he gave 
me more for nearly two hours. And then he stood up, twisting his fingers, and 
said, " You fill me full of music ; you are such a grand listener ; I will give you 
a sonata from Beethoven." When I went out I said to the lady who accom- 
panied me, " I thank God for such a capacity for enjoyment." There is some- 
thing to be thankful for. 

Stand with me on the summit of the Breven. Yonder are the white ridges 
of the Vaudois and Bernese Alps. Behind us, Sallenche with its bridge ; before 
us, hoary-headed Mont Blanc, the monarch of the Alps ; there, the Dome du 
Goute, the Aiguille du Dru, the Mer de Glace, the Glacier d'Argentiere, the 
Glacier des Bossons, the Glacier de Taconnay, and Chamouni, like a nest of 
ant-hills at our feet. The Arveyron, rushing from the Mer de Glace, joins the 
Arve, and, like a silver ribbon, winds through the valley. How deeply, darkly, 



THE MODERATE DRINKER. 



427 



beautifully blue the sky ! • How clear the atmosphere ! Hark ! Is that distant 
thunder? No; it is the ice cracking, miles away in yonder glacier. Listen. It 
is the soft sound of falling water, sweetly breaking the hush and stillness of 
nature in repose. How grand, how sublime, how awful ! Your eyes fill with 
tears, your nerves cjuiver, your heart thrills, and your whole soul seems to be 
absorbed by the wonderful grandeur and sublimity and beauty. And you thank 
God that you are created with such a capacity for enjoyment, and with such 
sources of gratification all around you and about you and above you, worthy of 
a God to give to man, and of man to receive reverently from his Maker. 

And that one fact of a little temporary gratification is all that you can 
bring in favor of the drink ! Why, if there was no gratification, there would be 
no danger. It is the gratification to a man of nervous susceptibility that con- 
stitutes the danger. The gratification produced by the action of drink on the 
brain and nervous system, in whatever phase it may present itself to you, is 
always harmful; whether you are very jolly, or whether you are outrageously 
merry, or whether you are sullen and surly, it makes very little difiference. It is 
no more degrading to be brutally drunk than it is to be sillily drunk, and have 
a whole city laughing at you. The very fact of intoxication is debasing and 
degrading to the man, v/hether you get enjoyment from it, or whether ft brings 
upon you the horrors of dcliriiim tremens. God speed the day when our dear 
country shall be freed from the agencies that tend to promote and perpetuate 
this great evil. 

(Being part of an address on the subject of temperance.) 




«-«r*s^^^'^ y- 




428 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Discounts of an Author. 

By SAMUEL L. CLEMENS (MARK TWAIN), of Connecticut. 

(Born 1835.) 



FTER Henry George had presented Joseph Jefferson and the actor 
had responded briefly but brig-htly, Air. Young introduced Mark 
Twain. It lias frequently been said and is generally believed that 
Twain never speaks in public without careful preparation, in order 
that his reputation as a humorist may not be jeopardized. That this 
is not true in this instance, however, was shown by the fact that he 
talked about occurrences of the evening and kept his hearers continually laugh- 
ing. " I have often wondered."" he said, in his familiar, long drawl. " how after- 
dinner talkers such as we have heard to-night manage to make such clever 
impromptu speeches." My impromptu speeches are all carefully prepared in 
advance, but I can't understand how these other fellows manage the thing. Now, 
there is Dougherty ; he gets u]) with all the confidence which is generally inspired 
by the preparation of a month and he talks just as nicely and smoothly as though 
he had never thought about the matter before. When he comes to a place to 
heave in poetry he heaves her in and when it is time for a stor\- it conies right 
out. I am not so much surprised about Depew. He once asked me how I 
managed my impromptu speeches and I told him. I taught him the art and I 
sometimes wish I hadn't. Henry George appears to have a faucet concealed 
somewhere about him. and he just turns it on and out the stuff flows. There 
has been a great deal of war talk* here to-night and I don't appear to have been 
considered in it. I was in the Confederate Army. I was in it for two weeks. 
If Pryor had to fight through the whole war to get a position as judge, I suppose 
that, considering the difference in our abilities, if I had fought four weeks I 
would have been made President, and if I had fought six weeks the war would 
have been ended. I am not much of a talker upon this kind of an occasion. 
You ought to allow me a discount. A few days ago I called at the ofifice of 
George Putnam, the publisher. I was met by a very severe-looking clerk, who 
told me that Mr. Putnam wasn't in. I knew that wasn't true, but I didn't blame 
the young man, for I don't think he liked the look of my clothes ; but I thought, 




Samuel L. Clemens (Mark Twain). 



430 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

as long as I had paid him a visit, I would do some business with him, and I said 
J wanted to buy a book — a book of travel, or something of that kind — and he 
handed me a volume which he said would cost three dollars. I said to him : 
" I am a publisher myself, and I suppose you allow the usual publisher's dis- 
count of 60 per cent."" The young man looked absent-minded, but said noth- 
ing. Then I remarked : " I am also an author, and I suppose you allow the usual 
author's discount of thirty per cent."" The young man looked pale. I addressed 
him further: " I also belong to the human race, and I suppose you allow the 
usual discount to the human race of ten per cent." The young man said nothing, 
but he took a pencil from behind his ear and made an arithmetical calculation 
and remarked : " After adding to that live per cent, discount for natural shyness, 
I find that the firm owes you fifteen cents." So, gentlemen, if you allow me on my 
impromptu speech all the discounts which are properly due me I think you 
will find that l^esides this dinner you are indebted to me about fifteen cents, 

and I hope the hat will be passed around and the amount collected. 

f 

(Being an address at a banquet of ex-Confederate and Union soldiers in Xew York city, October 1 :;, 
1890.) 




REPLY TO MR. SUMNER. 43 1 




Reply to Mr. Sumner. 

By STEPHEN ARNOLD DOUGLAS, of Illinois. 

(Born 1813, died 1861.) 



SHALL not detain the Senate by a detailed reply to the speech of the 
Senator from Massachusetts. Indeed, I should not deem it necessary 
to say one word, but for the personalities in which he has indulged, 
evincing a depth of malignity that issued from every sentence, making 
it a matter of self-respect with me to repel the assaults which have 
been made. 
As to the argument, we have heard it all before. Not a position, not a fact, 
not an argument has he used, which has not been employed on the same side 
of the chamber, and replied to by me twice. I shall not follow him, therefore, 
because it would only be repeating the same answer which I have twice before 
given to each of his positions. He seems to get up a speech as in Yankee land 
they get up a bedquilt. They take all the old calico dresses of various colors, 
that have been in the house from the days of their grandmothers, and invite the 
young ladies of the neighborhood in the afternoon and the young men to meet 
them at a dance in the evening. They cut up these pieces of old dresses and 
make pretty figures, and boast of what beautiful ornamental work they have 
made, although there was not a new piece of material in the whole quilt. Thus 
it is with' the speech which we have had rehashed here to-day, in regard to mat- 
ters of fact, matters of law, and matters of argument — everything but the per- 
sonal assaults and the malignity. * * * 

His endeavor seems to be an attempt to whistle to keep up his courage 
by defiant assaults upon us all. I am in doubt as to what can be his object. 
He has not hesitated to charge three-fourths of the Senate with fraud, with 
swindling, with crime, with infamy, at least one hundred times over in his 
speech. Is it his object to provoke some of us to kick him as we would a dog 
in the street, that he may get sympathy upon the just chastisement? What is 
the object of this denunciation against the body of which we are members? A 
hundred times he has called the Nebraska bill a " swindle," an act of crime, an 
act of infamy, and each time went on to illustrate the complicity of each man 



432 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

who voted for it in perpetrating the crime. He has brought it home as a per- 
sonal charge to those who passed the Nebraska bill, that they were guilty of a 
crime which deserved the just indignation of Heaven, and should make them 
infamous among men. 

Who are the Senators thus arraigned? He does me the honor to make me 
the chief. It was my good luck to have such a position in this body as to enable 
me to be the author of a great, wise measure, which the Senate has approved, 
and the country will indorse. That measure was sustained by about three- 
fourths of all the members of the Senate. It was sustained by a majority of the 
Democrats and a majority of the Whigs in this body. It was sustained by a 
majority of Senators from the slave-holding States, and a majority of Senators 
from the free States. The Senator, by his charge of crime, then, stultifies 
three-fourths of the whole body, a majority of the North, nearly the whole 
South, a majority of Whigs, and a majority of Democrats here. He says they 
are infamous. If he so believed, who could suppose that he would ever show 
his face among such a body of men ? How dare he approach one of those 
gentlemen to give him his hand after that act? If he felt the courtesies between 
men he would not do it. He would deserve to have himself spit in the face for 
doing so. * * * 

The attack of the Senator from Massachusetts now is not on me alone. 
Even the courteous and the accomplished Senator from South Carolina (Mr. 
Butler) could not be passed by in his absence. 

Mr. Mason. — Advantage was taken (if it. 

Mr. D()1'(;l.\s. — It is suggested that advantage is taken of his absence. I 
think that this is a mistake. I think the speech was written and practiced, and 
the gestures fixed; and, if that part had been stricken out, the Senator would 
not have known how to rejieat the speech. All that tirade of abuse must be 
brought down on the head of the venerable, the courteous, and the distinguished 
Senator from South Carolina. I shall not defend that gentleman here. Every 
Senator who knows him loves him. The Senator from Massachusetts may take 
e\ery charge made against him in his speech, and may verify by his oath, and 
by the oath of every one of his confederates, and there is not an honest man in 
this chamber who will not repel it as a slander. Your oaths cannot make a 
Senator feel that it was not an outrage to assail that honorable gentleman in 
the terms in which he has been attacked. He, however, will be here in due time 
to speak for himself, and to act for himself too. I know what will happen. The 
Senator from Massachusetts will go to him, whisper a secret apology in his ear, 
and ask him to accept that as satisfaction for a public outrage on his character! 
I know the Senator from Massachusetts is in the ha])it of doing those things. I 
have had some experience of his skill in that respect. '" * * 



REPLY TO MR. SUMNER. 



433 



Why these attacks on individuals by name, and two-thirds of the Senate 
collectively? Is it. the object to drive men here to dissolve social relations with 
political opponents? Is it to turn the Senate into a bear garden, where Senators 
cannot associate on terms which ought to prevail between gentlemen? These 
attacks are heaped upon me by man after man. When I repel them, it is inti- 
mated that I show some feeling on the subject. Sir, God grant that when I 
denounce an act of infamy I shall do it with feeling, and do it under the sudden 
impulses of feeling, instead of sitting up at night writing out my denunciation 
of a man wdiom I hate, copying it, having it printed, punctuating the proof- 
sheets, and repeating it before the glass, in order to give refinement to insult, 
which is only pardonable when it is the outburst of a just indignation. 

(Delivered in the United States Senate, May 20, 1856.) 





George Washington. 




PARTY SPIRIT. 435 



Party Spirit. 

By GEORGE WASHINGTON, of Viriginia. 

(Born 1732, died 1799.) 

HERE is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks 
upon the administration of the government, and serve to keep aUve 
the spirit of Hberty. This, within certain limits, is probably true ; 
and in governments of a monarchical cast, patriotism may look with 
indulgence, if not with favor, upon the spirit of party. But in those 
of the popular character, in governments purely elective, it is a 
spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, it is certain 
there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose; and, 
there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public 
opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a 
uniform vigilance to prevent its bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, 
it should consume. 

It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country 
should inspire caution in those intrusted with its admin'stration to confine 
themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exer- 
cise of their powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit 
of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of the departments in one, 
and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism: A 
just estimate of that love of power, and proneness to abuse it, which predomi- 
nates in the human heart, is sufficient to satisfy us of the truth of this position. 
The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing 
and distributing it into different dispositions, and constituting each the guardian 
of the public weal against invasions by others, has been evinced by experi- 
ments ancient and modem, some of them in our own country and under our 
own eyes. To preserve them must be as necessary as to institute them. If, in 
the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional 
powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in a 
way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpa- 
tion ; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the 
customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent 
must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient 
benefit which the use can at any time yield. 





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James Madison. 



THE REPUBLICAN EXPERIMENT. 437 




The Republican Experiment. 

By JAMES MADISON, of Virginia. 

(Born 1751, died 1836.) 



EARKEN not to the unnatural voice which tells you that the people of 
America, knit together as they are by so many cords of affection, can no 
longer live together as members of the same family ; can no longer con- 
tinue the mutual guardians of their mutual happiness ; can no longer 
be fellow citizens of one great respectable, and flourishing empire. 
Hearken not to the voice which petulantly tells you that the form of 
government recommended for your adoption is a novelty in the political world ; 
that it has never yet had a place in the theories of the wildest projectors; that 
it rashly attempts what it is impossible to accomplish. No, my countrymen : 
shut your ears against this unhallowed language. Shut your hearts against the 
poison which it conveys. The kindred blood which flows in the veins of 
American citizens, the mingled blood which they have shed in defense of their 
sacred rights, consecrate their union, and excite horror at the idea of their 
becoming aliens, rivals, enemies. And if novelties are to be shunned, believe 
me, the most alarming of all novelties, the most wild of all projects, the most 
rash of all attempts, is that of rending us in pieces, in order to preserve our 
liberties, and promote our happiness. But why is the experiment of an extended 
republic to be rejected, merely because it may comprise what is new? Is it 
not the glory of the people of America, that whilst they have paid a decent 
regard to the opinions of former times and other nations, they have not suffered 
a blind veneration for antiquity, for custom, or for names, to overrule the 
suggestions of their own good sense, the knowledge of their own situation, 
and the lessons of their own experience ? To this manly spirit posterity will be 
indebted for the possession, and the world for the example, of the numerous 
innovations displayed on the American theater, in favor of private rights and 
public happiness, 




438 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



An Author's Soldiering. 

By SAMUEL L. CLEMENS (MARK TWAIN), of Connecticut. 

(Born 1835.) 



OU Union veterans of Maryland have prepared your feast and ofifered 
to me, a rebel veteran of Missouri, the wound-healing bread and salt 
of a gracious hospitality. Do you realize all the vast significance of 
the situation? Do you sense the whole magnitude of this conjunction, 
and perceive with what opulence of blessing for this nation it is 
freighted? What is it we are doing? Reflect! Upon this stage to- 
night we play the closing scene of the mightiest drama of modern times, and 
ring down, for good and all, the curtain raised at Sumter six-and-twenty years 
ago. The two grand divisions of the nation, which we name in general terms 
the North and the South, have shaken hands long ago, and given and taken 
the kiss of peace. Was anything lacking to make the reconciliation perfect, 
the fusion of feeling complete? Yes. The great border States attached to 
those grand divisions, but belonging to neither of them, and independent of 
both, were silent ; had made no forgiving sign to each other across the chasm 
left by the convulsion of war, and the world grieved that this was so. But to- 
night the Union veteran of Maryland clasps hands with the rebel veteran of 
Missouri, and the gap is closed. In this supreme moment the imperfect weld- 
ing of the broken Union is perfected at last, and from this hour the seam of the 
joining shall no more be visible. The long tragedy is ended — ring down the 
curtain ! 

When your secretary invited me to this reunion of the Union Veterans 
of Maryland, he requested me to come prepared to clear up a matter which he 
said had long been a subject of dispute and bad blood in war circles in this 
country — to wit, the true dimensions of my military service in the Civil War, 
and the effect which they had upon the general result. I recognize the import- 
ance of this thing to history, and I have come prepared. Here are the details. 
I was IN THE Civil War two weeks. 

In that brief time I rose from private to second lieutenant. The monu- 
mental feature of my campaign was the one battle which my command fought — • 



AN AUTHOR'S SOLDIERING. 439 

it was in the summer of '61. If I do say it, it was the bloodiest battle ever fought 
in human history ; there is nothing approaching it for destruction of human 
life in the field, if you take in consideration the forces engaged, and the pro- 
portion of death to survival. And yet you do not even know the name of that 
battle. Neither do I. It had a name, but I have forgotten it. It is no use to 
keep private information which you can't show ofif. Now look at the way his- 
tory does. It takes the battle of Boonville, fought near by, about the date of 
our slaughter and shouts its teeth loose over it, and yet never even mentions ours ; 
doesn't even call it an " afifair; " doesn't call it anything at all; never even heard 
of it. Whereas, what are the facts? Why, these: In the battle of Boonville 
there were two thousand men engaged on the Union side, and about as many 
on the other — supposed to be. The casualties, all told, were two men killed ; 
and not all of these were killed outright, but only half of them, for the other 
man died in hospital next day. I know that, because his great-uncle was second 
cousin to my grandfather, who spoke three languages, and was perfectly honor- 
able and upright, though he had warts all over him, and used to — but never 
mind about that, the facts are just as I say, and I can prove it. Two men killed 
in that battle of Boonville, that's the whole result. All the others got away — 
on both sides. Now then, in our battle there were just fifteen men engaged, on 
our side — all brigadier generals but me, and I was a second lieutenant. On 
the other side there was one man. He was a stranger. We killed him. It 
was night, and we thought he was an army of observation ; he looked like an 
army of observation — in fact, he looked bigger than an army of observation 
would in the daytime ; and some of us believed he was trying to surround us, 
and some thought he was going to try to turn our position, and so we shot him. 
Poor fellow, he probably wasn't an army of observation, after all ; but that 
wasn't our fault ; as I say, he had all the look of it in that dim light. It was a 
sorrowful circumstance, but he took the chances of war, and he drew the 
wrong card ; he overestimated his fighting strength, and he suffered the likely 
result ; but he fell as the brave should fall — with his face to the foe and feet to 
the field — so we buried him with the honors of war, and took his things. So 
began and ended the only battle in the history of the world where the opposing 
force WAS utterly exterminated, swept from the face of the earth — to the 
last man. And yet, you don't know the name of that battle ; you don't even know 
the name of that man. Now, then, for the argument. Suppose I had continued 
in the war, and gone on as I began, and exterminated the opposing force every 
time — every two weeks — where would your war have been ? Why, you see 
yourself, the conflict would have been too one-sided. There was but one honor- 
able course for me to pursue, and I pursued it. I withdrew to private life, and 



440 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

gave the Union cause a chance. There, now, you have the whole thing in a 
nutsheh ; it was not my presence in the Civil ^^'ar that determined that tremen- 
dous contest — it was my retirement from it that brought the crash. It left the 
Confederate side too w^eak. And yet, when I stop and think, I cannot regret 
my course. No, when I look abroad over this happy land, with its wounds healed 
and its enmities forgotten ; this reunited sisterhood of majestic States ; this 
freest of free commonwealths the sun in his course shines upon ; this one sole 
country nameable in history or tradition where a man is a man and manhood the 
only royalty ; this people ruled by the justest and wholesomest laws and gov- 
ernment yet devised by the wisdom of men ; this mightiest of the civilized em- 
pires of the earth, in numbers, in prosperity, in progress and in promise; and 
reflect that there is no North, no South any more, but that as in the old time, it 
is now and will remain forever, in the hearts and speech of Americans, our 
land, our country, our giant empire, and the flag floating in its firmament our 
flag, I would not wish it otherwise. No, when I look about me and contem- 
plate these sublime results, I feel, deep down in my heart, that T acted for the 
best when I took my shoulder out from under the Confederacy and let it come 
down. 

(Being an address delivered at tlie banquet of tlie Union N'eterans in Baltimore.) 





RURAL LIFE IN THE EAST. 441 



Rural Life in the East. 

By IRVING BACHELLER, of New York. 

(Born 1859.) 



REVOLUTION has been going on in the north of New England and 
New York the past decade. The homes of the farmers have been 
the scene of pathetic changes. I have heard much of the melancholy 
reverses that followed the war in the South ; how the rich acres of 
the planter have become a squalid waste; how the negro dwells in 
the ruined mansion of his former master ; how the country gentle- 
man, with his horses and his hounds and all the splendid accessories of his 
social life, has abandoned his ancestral estate forever. But I tell you, gentle- 
men, there has been as great a change in the farms and firesides of the North. 
The sons of the Puritan, who settled in that stern climate, had simpler tastes and 
humbler homes than the sons of the Cavalier. Grace and reflection .took the 
place of wine and wit at their tables, and the bread which they had earned in 
the sweat of the brow was often eaten in the sweat of the spirit. But who that 
has lived among them fails to remember their neat and hospitable homes, now 
going to decay. The house is shaky and unclean ; the fence is half over, and 
no one cares to help it tip or down ; the stable is a ruin ; the well sweep lies in 
the grass. The sons have scattered; the daughters have gone forth to the 
altar ; the old folks have moved to town or cemetery ; the farm has been sold 
and mortgaged and resold, and now it is the home of some new American who 
can accommodate his living to its diminished income. The present master of 
the house has no inconvenient burden of pride. He will live on what he cannot 
sell, and will prosper, while his predecessors would have gone to the wall. To 
understand the causes of this revolution, we must glance for a moment at the 
character of the men who, more than half a century ago, moved out of Vermont 
and settled the St. Lawrence Valley. They were the sons of the Puritans — a 
race of fighters, the like of which the world had never seen. Their forefathers 
had made the name of England terrible, and, coming to these inhospitable 
shores, routed the savage, and the forests fell before them as they turned their 
faces to the West Those who followed the star of empire to the mountain 



442 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

barriers of Vermont were a set of rug-ged, daring pioneers — the hardiest of 
their race. They were the men of iron who fought at Bennington and Ticon- 
deroga. They were the men of whom Burgoyne said, " Those Yankees don't 
know how to run." They were men who indulged in profanity and prayer — 
but their prayers were heartfelt and their profanity necessary. These men had 
some of the grace of God and the pride of the devil. It was an unconquerable 
pride of spirit that made them a thrifty people and a race of fighters who never 
fled before a foe. They did not suspect the existence of this affliction of pride. 
But, if I mistake not, it helped them win their successes in war, politics, and 
the schools, and it is that spirit which is driving the family from the farm 
because they can no longer maintain appearances on its income. Ships are 
bringing the impoverished hordes of every nation — men who can hold the 
plow and milk the cow as well as the Yankee, and have no need of pie. It 
matters not where he settles, whether east or west, his product reaches the same 
market, and his competition with the farmer of the St. Lawrence Valley is as 
direct as if he were in the same township. And it occurs to me that the 
Yankee farmer has but one hope before him, rnd it lies in the education of 
his children. I remember standing, last summer, in the ruins of my early 
home. The clapboards were falling from the house ; the porch had sagged at 
one corner; some window-panes were missing, and the sash was stuflfed with 
rags. The neat and cleanly fireside, hallowed by the merriment and mourning 
of those most dear to me, bad come to evil days. The dooryard was a museum 
of rubbish. The pines that had whispered to my childish fancy in the hush 
of many a summer night were dying, and rank weeds nodded where the roses 
grew. A man stood on the piazza squinting at me. He was wearing one sus- 
pender and an ancient pair of trousers that probably covered the nakedness of 
Ills grandfather. His tongue had halted half-way between speech and expec- 
toration. A smile filtered through his tangled beard. I recognized in him the 
seedy remnant of a once noble race. 

" Hello ! " said I. 

" Hello! " said he. " who be you? " 

I told him. 

" Wouldn't a knowed ye," said he ; " hitch in yer boss." 

" Can't," said I. 

" They say ye've done noble down ther," said he. 

" How've you done?" said I. 

" Jus' livin'," said he. 

" Suppose you can't raise anything but whiskers here, now." said T, 

** No," said he ; " farmin's played out." 




Irving Bacheller. 



444 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

" Quit it," said I. 

" What'll I do," said he. 

" Well," said I, " I should think you might die without trying very hard." 

" Can't," said he. 

" Why," said I. 

" Morgidged," said he. " Wife an' children. I hain't no right to die. 
Everything's morgidged." 

While we were talking, one of the old-school farmers drove in. He held 
a mortgage on the place that was dated some time in the forties, and every acre 
of the country side had been under bond to him for. lo, these many years. He 
began scolding me. 

" If yer father had kept his boys here, this farm wouldn't a looked as it 
does now," said he. 

" That's all right," said the tenant. " If he'd a stayed here, the farm would 
a looked better, but he'd looked a d n sight worse." 

When Alvinza Hayward returned to the home of his youth in Canton, 
after winning great wealth and distinction in California, there was a delegation 
to meet him at the depot. The spokesman of the party congratulated Mr. 
Hayward on his enterprise in leaving the farm, and that gentleman startled them 
by replying that he didn't have enterprise enough to stay. 

The condition of things which I have tried to describe is one of vital 
interest to St. Lawrence University. In these days when mere brute strength 
goes begging for employment, a liberal education is the only hope of the sons oi 
the Yankee. Every citizen of moderate means should take warning that unless 
he wishes his son to work in the ditch with an Italian, he must send him to 
college, not to school — that isn't enough in the competition of to-day — but 
to college. So many are stepping up to the higher planes of culture now, that 
nothing else will give him a fighting chance. 

(From a speech delivered at a dinner to Prof. Walter B. Gunnison at the Hanover Club. Rrooklyn. Decen;- 
ber 29, 1896.) 





A WHITE LIFE FOR TWO. 445 



A White Life For Two. 

By FRANCES E. WILLARD. 

(Born 1839, died 1898.) 
Supt. Social Purity Work, National IV. C. T. U. 



MERICA may well be called " God's Country," a gracious Mother- 
land that women well might live to serve or die to save. For in 
America, home questions have become the living issues of the time, 
and " Home Protection " is the battle cry of preachers, publicists, 
and politicians. The mighty war of words that culminated in the 
Presidential election of 1888, was waged on both s'des in the interest 
of the home, but only on a materialistic money basis. The three questions that 
alone engross our people are the Temperance, the Labor, and the Woman Ques- 
tions, and these three agree in one. Only by convincing Labor that a high 
tariff meant material protection for the home, was that election won; only by 
convincing wage-workers and women that the outlawing of the saloon means 
protection for those who dwell within the home, will Prohibition ever gain the 
day; only by con zincing wage-workers and temperance voters that through 
equal suffrage women will help to protect both the external and the internal 
interests of the home, will the Woman Question ever be wrought out in Govern- 
ment. But beneath this trinity of issues is the fount from which they flow and 
that is Home itself, and back of Home is the one relationship that makes it 
possible. In view of this, I dare affirm that the reciprocal attraction of two 
natures, out of a thousand million, for each other, is the strongest, though one 
of the most unnoted proofs of a beneficent Creator. It is the fairest, sweetest 
Rose of Time, whose petals and whose perfume expand so far that we are all 
inclosed and sheltered in their tenderness and beauty. For, folded in its heart, 
we find the germ of every home; of those beatitudes, fatherhood and mother- 
hood; the brotherly and sisterly affection, the passion of the patriot, the calm 
and steadfast love of the philanthropist. For the faithfulness of two. each to the 
other, alone makes possible the true home, the pure church, the righteous nation, 
the great, kind brotherhood of man. 



446 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

The inmost instincts of each human spirit must cry out to God, 

" Comfort our souls with Love, 

Love of all human kind, 
Love special, close, in which like sheltered dove 

Each heart its own safe nest may find; 
And Love that turns above adoringly, contented to resign 
All loves if need be, for the love divine." 

Marriage is not, as some surface-thinkers have endeavored to make out, 
an episode in man's life and an event in woman's. Sup your fill of horrors on 
the daily record of suicides by young men who are lovers, of sweethearts shot, 
and murdered wives, if you have ever fancied marriage to be the unequal thing 
that such phrasing indicates. Nay, it is the sum of earthly weal or woe to 
both. Doubtless there are in this modern land and age, almost as many noble 
men unmated because they had to be, as there are women. Because of a 
memory cherished, an estrangement unexplained, an ideal unrealized, a duty 
bravely met, many of the best men living go their way through life alone. 
Sometimes I think that of the two it is man who loves home best; for while 
woman is hedged into it by a thousand considerations of expediency and preju- 
dice, he, 

" With all the world before him where to choose," 

still chooses home freely and royally for her sake who is to him the world's 
supreme attraction. 

The Past has bequeathed us no records more sublime than the heart- 
histories of Dante, of Petrarch, of Michael Angelo, and in our own time, of 
Washington Irving, Henry Martyn, and others whom we dare not name. It 
was a chief among our own poets who said: — 

" I look upon the stormy wild, 
I have no wife, I have no child; 
For me there gleams no household hearth 
I've none to love me on the earth." 

We know that " he who wrote home's sweetest song ne'er had one of his 
own," and our gracious Will Carleton sang concerning John Howard Payne — 

" Sure, when thy gentle spirit fled 
To lands beyond the azure dome, 
With arms outstretched God's angels said, 
' Welcome to Heaven's home, sweet home.' " 




Frances E. Willard. 



448 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

There are men and women — some of them famous, some unknown — the 
explanation of whose uncompanioned Hves may be found in the principle that 
underlies those memorable words appHed to Washington: "Heaven left him 
childless that a Nation might call him Father." 

In such considerations as I have here urged, and in this noblest side of 
human nature, a constant facto" always to be counted on, I found my faith 
in the response of the people to the work of promoting social purity. " Sweet 
bells jangled, out of tune," now fill the air with minor cadences, often, alas, 
with discords that are heart-breaks, but all the same they are " sweet bells," 
and shall chime the gladdest music heaven has heard, " Some sweet day, by and 
by." This gentle age into which we have happily been born, is attuning the 
twain whom God hath made for such great destiny, to higher harmonies than 
any other age has known, by a reform in the denaturalizing methods of a civ- 
ilization largely based on force, by which the boy and girl have been sedulously 
trained apart. They are now being set side by side in school, in church, in 
government, even as God sets male and female everywhere side by side through- 
out his realm of law, and has declared them one throughout his realm of grace. 
Meanwhile, the conquest, through invention, of matter by mind, lifts woman 
from the unnatural subjugation of the age of force. In the presence of a Corliss 
engine, which she could guide as well as he, but which is an equal mystery to 
them both, men and women learn that they are fast equalizing on the plane 
of matter, as a prediction of their confessed equalization upon the planes of 
mind and of morality. 

We are beginning to train those with each other who were formed for 
each other, and the American Home, with its Christian method of a two- 
fold headship, based on laws natural and divine, is steadily rooting out all that 
remains of the media'val continental and harem philosophies concerning this 
greatest problem of all time. The true relations of that complex being whom 
God created by uttering the mystic thought that had in it the potency of Para- 
dise: '' In our own image let us make man. and let tliciii have dominion over 
all the earth," will ere long be ascertained by means of the new correlation 
and attuning, each to other, of a more complete humanity upon the Christ- 
like basis that " there shall be no more curse." The Temperance Reform is this 
correlation's necessary and true forerunner, for while the race-brain is bewil- 
dered it cannot be thought out. The Labor Reform is another part, for only 
under co-operation can material conditions be adjusted to a noncombatant state 
of society, and every yoke lifted from the laboring man lifts one still heavier 
from the woman at his side. The Equal Suffrage Movement is another part, 
for a government organized and conducted by one-half the human unit, a 



A WHITE LIFE FOR TWO. 449 

government of the minority, by the minority, for the minority, must always 
bear unequally upon the whole. The Social Purity Movement could only come 
after its heralds, the three other reforms I have mentioned, were well under 
way, because alcoholized brains would not tolerate its expression; women who 
had not learned to work would lack the individuality and intrepidity required to 
organize it, and women perpetually to be disfranchised, could not hope to see 
its final purposes wrought out in law. But back of all were the father and 
mother of all reforms — Christianity and Education — to blaze the way for all 
these later comers. 

The Woman's Christian Temperance Union is doing no work more im- 
portant than that of reconstructing the ideal of womanhood. The sculptor Hart 
told me, when I visited his studio in Florence many years ago, that he was 
investing his life to work into marble a new feminine type which should 
" express, unblamed," the Twentieth Century's womanhood. The Venus de 
Medici, with its small head and button-hole eyelids, matched the Greek concep- 
tion of woman well, he thought, but America was slowly evolving another and 
a loftier type. His statue, named by him " Woman Triumphant," and pur- 
chased by patriotic ladies of his native State, Kentucky, adorns the City Hall 
at Lexington, and shows 

" A perfect woman, nobly planned, 
To warn, to comfort, and command; 
A creature not too bright or good, 
For human nature's daily food, 
And yet a spirit pure and bright, 
With something of an angel's light." 

She is the embodiment of what shall be. In an age of force, woman's 
greatest grace was to cling; in this age of peace she doesn't cling much, but is 
every bit as tender and as sweet as if she did. She has strength and indi- 
viduality, a gentle seriousness; there is more of the sisterly, less of the syren — 
more of the duchess and less of the doll. Woman is becoming what God 
meant her to be, and Christ's Gospel necessitates her being, the companion and 
counselor, not the incumbrance and toy, of man. 

To meet this new creation, how grandly men themselves are growing; 
how considerate and brotherly, how pure in word and deed! The world has 
never yet known half the aptitude of character and life to which men will attain 
when they and women live in the same world. It doth not yet appear what they 
shall be, or we either, for that matter, but in many a home presided over by a 



450 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Temperance voter and a White Ribbon worker, I have thought the Heavenly 
Vision was really coming down to terra firma. 

With all my heart I believe, as do the best of men of the Nation, that 
woman will bless and brighten every place she enters, and that she will enter 
every place on the round earth. Its welcome of her presence and her power 
will be the final test of any institution's fitness to survive. 

Happily for us, every other genuine reform helps to push forward the 
white car of Social Purity. The great Peace Movement, seeking as its final 
outcome a Court of International Arbitration as a substitute for war, promises 
more momentum to our home cause than to almost any other. For as the 
chief corner-stone of t)ie peaceful State is the hearthstone, so the chief pulver- 
izer of that corner-stone is war. 

An organized and systematic work for the promotion of Social Purity was 
undertaken in 1885 by the Woman's Christian Temperance Union. Under the 
three subdivisions of Preventive, Reformatory, and Legal Work, this society 
has gone steadily forward until the White Cross Pledge, appealing to the 
chivalry of men, has grown familiar in thousands of homes, and the White 
Shield Pledge, appealing to the chivalry of women, is following fast after 
the first. 

Its pledges are based on the belief that you cannot in mature years get 
out of a character what was not built into it when the youthful nature was like 
"wax to receive and marble to retain;" that the arrest of thought must be 
secured by mother, minister, and teacher, before the common talk of street and 
play-ground has wrenched that thought away from the white line of purity and 
truth. Innocence may be founded on ignorance, but virtue is evermore based 
upon knowledge. In the presence of temptation one is a rope of sand, the 
other, a keen Damascus blade. To be forewarned is the only way to be fore- 
armed. A precipice lies before every boy and girl when they emerge beyond 
the sheltering fortress of their home, but a safe, rure path leads around it; we 
must gently warn them of the one; we must tenderly lead them to the other. 

The personal habits of men and women must reach the same high level. 
On a low plane and for selfish ends primeval and mediaeval man wrought out, 
with fiercest cruelty, virtue as the only tolerated estate of one-half the human 
race. On a high plane Christianity, working through modern womanhood, 
shall yet make virtue the only tolerated estate of the other half of the human 
race, and may Heaven speed that day! A woman knows that she must walk 
the straight line of a true life or men will look upon her with disdain. A man 
needs, for his own best good, to find that in the eyes of women, just the same 
is true of him. 



A WHITE LIFE FOR TWO. 451 

Evermore be it remembered, this earnest effort to bring in the day of 
" sweeter manners, purer laws " is as much in man's interest as our own. While 
all this heritage of a less-developed past has wrought such anguish and injustice 
upon woman as she is to-day, it has been even more harmful to man, for it 
is always worse for character to be sinning than to be sinned against. Our 
laws and social customs make it too easy for men to do wrong. They are 
not sufficiently protected by the strong hand of penalty, from themselves, from 
the sins that do most easily beset them, and from the mad temptations that 
clutch at them on every side; we ask for the total prohibition of the liquor 
trafBc, which is leagued with every crime that is perpetrated against the physi- 
cally weaker sex, and we ask for the ballot, that law and law-maker may be 
directly influenced by our instincts of self-protection and home protection. 

We hear much of physical culture for boys, but it is girls that need this 
most. We hear much of manual training schools to furnish ever}^ boy at school 
with a bread-winning weapon; but in the interest of boys and girls alike, girls 
need this most. Hence it is in our plans to work for these. Mothers' Meetings 
are becoming one of the most familiar features of the W. C. T. U. For these 
we prepare programs, leaflets, and courses of reading at the Woman's Temper- 
ance Publishing House, Chicago, from which hundreds of thousands of pledges 
and pages of literature have gone, as pure and elevated in style and spirit as 
consecrated pens could render them. 

Reformatory Work is the most difBcult of all and yet has been of all 
others most earnestly carried forward thus far by women. Matrons have been 
placed in the police stations to look after arrested women, Reading Rooms, 
Lodging-Houses and Industrial Homes for women are multiplying now on 
every hand. State care for moral as well as mental incapables is being urged 
and with some small beginnings of success. Statistics of such work are difficult 
to gain. A single fact vouched for by the women who have in charge one of 
these homes in Massachusetts, is fitted to encourage every worker in this trying 
field. They tell us that one woman who had been arrested forty-five times was 
taken to the home, lifted by kindness from the depths, put into self-supporting 
lines, and for seven years has been an honorable, hard-working woman, happy 
in her rescued life. 

As I have said, we are not working for ourselves alone in this great cause 
of Social Purity. As an impartial friend to the whole human race in both its 
fractions, man and woman, I, for one, am not more in earnest for this great 
advance because of the good it brings to the gentler than because of the bless- 
ing that it prophesies for the stronger sex. I have long believed that when 
that greatest of all questions, the question of a life companionship, shall be 



452 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

decided on its merits, pure and simple, and not complicated with the other 
questions, " Did she get a good home? " " Is he a generous provider? " " Will 
she have plenty of money? " then will come the first fair chance ever enjoyed 
by young manhood for the building up of genuine character and conduct. For 
it is an immense temptation to the " sowing of wild oats," when the average 
youth knows that the smiles he covets most will be his all the same, no matter 
whether he smokes, swears, drinks beer, and leads an impure life, or not. The 
knowledge on his part that the girls of his village or " set " have no way out 
of dependence, reproach, or oddity except to say " yes " when he chooses to 
" propose; '" that they dare not frown on his lower mode of life; that the world 
is indeed all before him where to choose ; that not one girl in one hundred is 
endowed with the talent and pluck that make her independent of him and his 
ilk — all this gives him a sense of freedom to do wrong which, added to inher- 
ited appetite and outward temptation, is impelling to ruin the youth of our 
day with a force strong as gravitation and relentless as fate. Besides all this, 
the utterly false sense of his own value and importance which '* Young America " 
acquires from seeing the sweetest and most attractive beings on earth thus 
virtually subject to him, often develops a lordliness of manner which is ridicu- 
lous to contemplate in boys who, otherwise, would be modest, sensible, and 
brotherly young fellows such as we are most of all likely to find in coeduca- 
tional schools, where girls take their full share of prizes, and where many 
young women have in mind a European trip with some girl friend, or mayhap 
" a career." 

Multiplied forces in law and gospel are to-day conspiring for the deliver- 
ance of our young men from the snares of the present artificial environment 
and estimate of their own value; but the elevation of their sisters to the plane 
of perfect financial and legal independence, from which the girls can dictate 
the equitable terms, " You must be as pure and true as you require me to be, 
ere I give you my hand," is the brightest hope that gleams in the sky of modern 
civilization for our brothers; and the greater freedom of women to make of 
marriage an affair of the heart and not of the purse, is the supreme result of 
Christianity, up to this hour. 

There is no man whom women honor so deeply and sincerely, as the man 
of chaste life; the man who breasts the bufYetings of temptation's swelling 
waves, like some strong swimmer in his agony, and makes the port of perfect 
self-control. Women have a thousand guaranties and safeguards for their 
purity of life. " Abandon hope, all ye who enter here." is written in letters of 
flame for them above the haunt of infamy, while men may come and go and 



A WHITE LIFE FOR TWO. 453 

are yet smilingly received in the most elegant homes. But in spite of all this 
accursed latitude, how many men are pure and true! 

It is said, that when darkness settles on the Adriatic Sea, and fishermen are 
far from land, their wives and daughters, just before putting out the lights in 
their humble cottages, go down by the shore and in their clear, sweet voices 
sing the first lines of the Ave Maria. Then they listen eagerly, and across the 
sea are borne' to them the deep tones of those they love, singing the strains that 
follow, " Ora pro nobis," and thus each knows that with the other all is well. 
I often think that from the home-life of the Nation, from its mothers and sisters, 
daughters and sweethearts, there sound through the darkness of this transition 
age the tender notes of a dearer song, whose burden is being taken up and 
echoed back to us from those far out amid the billows of temptation, and its sacred 
words are, "Home, Sweet Home! " God grant that deeper and stronger may 
grow that heavenly chorus from men's and women's lips and lives! For with 
all its faults, and they are many, I believe the present marriage system to be 
the greatest triumph of past Christianity, and that it has created and conserves 
more happy homes than the world has ever before known. Any law that ren- 
ders less binding the mutual, life-long loyalty of one man and woman to each 
other, which is the central idea of every home, is an unmitigated curse to that 
home and to humanity. Around this union, which alone renders possible a 
pure society, and a permanent state, the law should build its utmost safeguards, 
and upon this union the gospel should pronounce its most sacred benedictions. 
But while I hold these truths to be self-evident, I believe that a constant evo- 
lution is going forward in the home as in every other place, and that we may 
have but dimly dreamed the good in store for those whom God for holiest 
love hath made. 

In the nature of the case, the most that even Christianity itself could do 
at first, though it is the strongest force ever let loose upon the planet, was to 
separate one man and one woman from the common herd, into each home, 
telling the woman to remain there in grateful quietness, while the man stood 
at the door to defend its sacred shrine with fist and spear, to insist upon its 
rights of property, and later on, to represent it in the State. Thus, under the 
conditions of a civilization crude and material, grew up that well-worn maxim 
of the common law, " Husband and wife are one, and that one is the husband." 
But such supreme power as this brought to the man supreme temptation. By 
the laws of mind he legislated first for himself and afterward for the physically 
weaker one within " his " home. The fcmme conz'erte is not a character appro- 
priate to our peaceful, home-like communities, although she may have been 
and doubtless was a necessary figure in the days when women were safe only 



454 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

a.s they were shut up in castles and when they were the booty chiefly sought 
in war. To-day a woman may circumnavigate the world alone and yet be 
unmolested. Our marriage laws and customs are changing to meet these new 
conditions. It will not do to give the husband of the modem woman power 
to whip his wife, " provided the stick he uses is not larger than his finger; " to 
give him the right to will away her unborn child; to have control over her 
property; to make all the laws under. which she is to live; adjudicate all her 
penalties; try her before juries of men; conduct her to prison under the care 
of men; cast the ballot for her; and in general, hold her in the estate of a per- 
petual minor. It will not do to let the modern man determine the age of 
" consent," settle the penalties that men should suffer whose indignities 
and outrages upon women are worse than death, and by his exclusive power to 
make all laws and choose all ofificers, judicial and executive, thus leaving his 
own case w^holly in his own hands. To continue this method is to make it as 
hard as possible for men to do right, and as easy as possible for them to do 
wrong; the magnificent possibilities of manly character are best prophesied from 
the fact that under such a system so many men are good and gracious. My 
theory of marriage in its relation to society would give this postulate. Hus- 
band and wife are one, and that one is — husband and wife. I believe they 
will never come to the heights of purity, of power and peace, for which -they 
were designed in Heaven, until this better law prevails. One undivided half 
of the world for wife and husband equally; coeducation to mate them on the 
plane of mind; equal property rights to make her God's own free woman, not 
coerced into marriage for the sake of support, nor a bond-slave after she is 
married, who asks her master for the price of a paper of pins, and gives him 
back the change; or, if she be a petted favorite, who owes the freedom of his 
purse wholly to his will and never to her right; woman left free to go her 
honored and self-respecting way as a maiden in pcrpcfiio, rather than marry a 
man whose deterioration through the alcohol and nicotine habits is a deadly 
menace to herself and the descendants that such a marriage has invoked — 
these are the outlooks of the future that shall make the marriage system, never 
a failure since it became monogamous, an assured, a permanent, a paradisaical 
success. 

Then comes the statelier Eden back to men. 

The reign the world's great bridals chaste jind calm. 

Then springs the crowning race of humankind. 
May these things be. 




THE SOLITUDE OF SELF. 455 



The Solitude of Self. 

By ELIZABETH CADY STANTQN, of New York. 

(Born 1815.) 



I HE point I wish plainly to bring before you on this occasion is the indi- 
viduality of each human soul; — our Protestant idea; the right of 
individual conscience and judgment, — our republican idea; individual 
citizenship. In discussing the rights of woman, we are to consider 
first what belongs to her as an individual, in a world of her own, the 
arbiter of her own destiny, an imaginary Robinson Crusoe, with her 
woman Friday on a solitary island. Her rights, under such circumstances, are 
to use all her faculties for her own safety and happiness. 

Secondly, if we consider her as a citizen, as a member of a great nation, 
she must have the same rights as all other members, according to the funda- 
mental principles of our Government. 

Thirdly, viewed as a woman, an equal factor in civilization, her rights and 
duties are still the same; individual happiness and development. 

Fourthly. It is only the incidental relations of life, such as mother, wife, 
sister, daughter, that may involve some special duties and training. In the 
usual discussion in regard to woman's sphere, such men as Herbert Spencer, 
Frederic Harrison, and Grant Allen uniformly subordinate her rights and 
duties as an individual, as a citizen, as a woman, to the necessities of these 
incidental relations, some of which a large class of women may never assume. 
In discussing the sphere of man, we do not decide his rights as an indi- 
vidual, as a citizen, as a man; by his duties as a father, a husband, a brother, 
or a son, relations, some of which he might never fill. Moreover, he would 
be better fitted for these very relations, and whatever special work he might 
choose to do, to earn his bread, by the complete development of all his facul- 
ties as an individual. 

Just so with woman. The education that will fit her to discharge the duties 
in the largest sphere of hum?n usefulness, will best fit her for whatever special 
work she may be compelled to do. 



456 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

The isolation of every human soul, the necessity of self-dependence, must 
give each individual the right to choose her own surroundings. 

The strongest reason for giving women all the opportunities for iiigher 
education, for the full development of her faculties and forces of mind and 
body, for giving her the most enlarged freedom of thought and action; a com- 
plete emancipation from all forms of bondage, of custom, dependence, super- 
stition; from all the crippling influences of fear, is the solitude and personal 
responsibility of her own individual life. The strongest reason why we ask 
for woman a voice in the Government, under which she lives; in the religion 
she is asked to believe; equality in social life, where she is the chief factor; a 
place in the trades and professions, where she may earn her bread, is because 
of her birthright to self-sovereignty; because, as an individual, she must rely 
on herself. No matter how much women prefer to lean, to be protected and 
supported, nor how much men desire to have them do so, they must make the 
voyage of life alone, and for safety in an emergency, they must know something 
of the laws of navigation. To guide our own craft, we must be Captain, 
Pilot, Engineer; with chart and compass to watch at the wheel; to watch the 
winds and waves and know when to take in the sail; and to read the signs of 
coming storms in the firmament over all. It matters not whether the solitary 
voyager is man or woman. Nature having endowed them equally, leaves them 
to their own skill and judgment in the hour of danger, and if not equal to the 
occasion, alike they perish. 

To appreciate the importance of fitting every human soul for independent 
action, think for a moment of the immeasurable solitude of self. We com^ 
into the world alone, unlike all who have gone before us; we leave it alone, 
under circumstances peculiar to ourselves. No mortal ever has been, no mortal 
ever will be, like the soul just launched on the sea of life. There can never 
again be just such a combination of prenatal influences; never again just such 
environment as make up the infancy, youth, and manhood of this one. Nature 
never repeats itself, and the possibilities of one human soul will never be found 
in another. No one has ever found two blades of ribbon grass alike, and no 
one will ever find two human beings alike. Seeing, then, what must be the 
infinite diversity in human character, we can, in a measure, appreciate the loss 
to a nation, when any large class of the people is uneducated and unrepresented 
in the Government. We ask for the complete development of every individual, 
first for his own benefit and happiness. In fitting out an army we give each 
soldier his own knapsack, arms, powder, his blanket, cup, knife, fork and spoon. 




Elizabeth Cady Stanton. 



458 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

We provide alike for all their individual necessities and then each man bears his 
own burden. 

Again we ask complete individual development for the general good; for 
the consensus of the competent on the whole round of human interests — on 
all questions of national life; and here each man must bear his share of the 
general burden. It is sad to see how soon friendless children are left to bear 
their own burdens; before they can analyze their feelings, before they can even 
tell their joys and sorrows they are thrown on their own resources. The 
great lesson that Nature seems to teach us at all ages is self-dependence, self- 
protection, and self-support. 

What a touching instance of a child's solitude, of that hunger of the heart 
for love and recognition, in the case of the little girl who helped to dress a 
Christmas tree for the children of the family in which she served. On finding 
there was no present for herself, she slipped away in the darkness and spent the 
night in an open field sitting on a stone, and when found in the morning, was 
weeping as if her heart would break. No mortal will ever know the thoughts 
that passed through the mind of that friendless child in the long hours of that 
cold night, with only the silent stars to keep her company. The mention of 
her case in the daily papers moved many generous hearts to send her presents 
but in the hours of her keenest suffering she was thrown wholly on herself for 
consolation. 

In youth our most bitter disappointments, our brightest hopes and ambi- 
tions are known only to ourselves, even our friendship and love we never fully 
share with another; there is something of every passion, in every s'tuation we 
conceal. Alike in our triumphs and our defeats. The successful candidate for 
the Presidency and his opponent, each have a solitude peculiarly his own, and 
good form forbids either to speak of his pleasure or regret. The solitude of tl e 
King on his throne and the prisoner in his cell, differs in character and degre.*, 
but it is solitude nevertheless. We ask no sympathy from others in tl:e anxiety 
and agony of a broken friendship or shattered love. When death sunders our 
nearest ties, alone we sit in the shadow of our affliction. Alike mid the great-^^^ 
triumphs and darkest tragedies of life, we walk alone. On the divine heights 
of human attainment, eulogized and worshipped as a hero, or saint, we stand 
alone. In ignorance, poverty and vice, as a pauper or criminal alone we starve 
or steal, alone we suffer the sneers and rebuffs of our fellows, alone we are 
hunted and wounded through dark courts and alleys, in by-ways and highways, 
alone we stand at the judgment seat, alone in the orison cell we lament our 



THE SOLITUDE OF SELF. 459 

crimes and misfortunes, and alone we expiate them on the gallows. In hours 
like these we realize the awful solitude of individual life, its pains, its penalties, 
and its responsibilities ; hours in which the youngest and most helpless are thrown 
on their own resources for guidance and consolation. Seeing, then, that life 
must ever be a march and a battle; that each soldier must be equipped for his 
own protection, it is the height of cruelty to rob the individual of a single 
natural right, and the greatest of these is an equal voice in the Government 
under which we live. 

To throw obstacles in the way of a complete education, is like putting out 
the eyes, to deny the rights of property is like cutting off the hands, to deny 
political equality is to rob the ostracised of all self-respect; of credit in the 
market place; of recompense in the world of work; of a voice in those who make 
and administer the law; a choice m the jury before whom they are tried, and 
in the judge who decides their punishment. 

Shakespeare's play of Titus and Andromicus contains a terrible satire on 
woman's position in the 19th century. " Rude men," the play tells us, 
seized the King's daughter, cut out her tongue, cut off her hands and then 
bade her " go call for water and wash her hands." What a picture of woman's 
position. Robbed of her natural rights, handicapped by law and custom at 
every turn, yet compelled to fight her own battles; and in the emergencies of 
life to fall back on herself for protection. 

The girl of sixteen, thrown on the world, to support herself, to make her 
own place in society, to resist the temptations that surround her, and maintain 
a spotless integrity, must do all this by native force — a superior education. 
She does not acquire this power by being trained to trust others and distrust 
herself. If she wearies of the struggle, finding it hard work to swim up stream 
and allows herself to drift with the current, she will find plenty of company, but 
not one to share her misery in the hour of her deepest humiliation. If she tries 
to retrieve her position, to conceal the past, her life is hedged about with fears, 
lest willing hands should tear the veil from what she fain would h-ide. Young 
and friendless, she knows the bitter solitude of self. 

How the little courtesies of life on the surface of society, deemed so im- 
portant from man towards woman, fade into utter insignificance, in view of the 
deeper tragedies in which she must play her part alone, where no human aid 
is possible. The young wife and mother, at the head of some establishment, 
with a kind husband to shield her from the adverse winds of life, with wealth, 
fortune, and position, has a certain harbor of safety, secure against the ordinary 



'460 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

ills of life. But to manage a Household; have a desirable influence in society; 
keep her friends and the affections of her husband, train her children and ser- 
vants well, she must have rare common sense, wisdom, diplomacy, and a nice 
knowledge of human nature. To do all this, she needs the cardinal virtues and 
the strong points of character that the most successful statesman possesses. 

An uneducated woman, trained to dependence, with no resources in her- 
self, must make a failure of any position in life. But society says womjcn do 
not need a knowledge of the world, the liberal training that experience in public 
life must give, all the advantages of collegiate education, but when, for the lack 
of all this, the woman's happiness is wrecked, alone she bears her humiliation; 
and the solitude of the weak and the ignorant is indeed pitiable. In the wild 
chase for the prizes of life they are ground to powder. 

In age, when the pleasures of youth are passed, children grown up, mar- 
ried, and gone, the hurry and bustle of life in a measure over, when the hands 
are weary of active service, when the old armchair and the fireside are the 
chosen resorts, then men and women alike must fall back on their own re- 
sources. If they cannot find companionship in books, if thev have no interest 
in the vital questions of the hour, no interest in watching the consummation of 
reforms, with which they might have been identified, they soon pass into their 
dotage. The more fully all tlie faculties of the mind are developed and kept 
in use, the longer the period of vigor and active interest in all around us con- 
tinues. If from a lifelong participation in public aff^airs. a woman feels respon- 
sible for the laws regulating our system of education, the discipline of our 
jails and prisons, the sanitary condition of our private houses, p^iblic build- 
ings, and thoroughfares, an interest in commerce, finance, and foreign relations, 
in any or all these questions her solitude will at least be respectable, and she 
will not be driven to gossip or scandal for entertainment. 

The chief reason for opening to every soul all the doors to the whole round 
of human duties and pleasures, is the individual development thus' attained, 
the resources thus provided under the circumstances to mitigate the soli- 
tude that at times must come to every one. I once asked Prince Krapotkin. a 
Russian Nihilist, how he endured his long years in prison deprived of books, 
pen, ink, and paper. " x\h! " said he, " I thought out many questions in which 
I had a deep interest. In the pursuit of an idea, I took no note of time. When 
tired of solving knotty problems, I recited all the beautiful passages in prose 
and verse I had ever learned. I became acquainted with myself and my own 
resources. I had a world of my own, a vast empire, that no Russian jailer 
or Czar could invade." 



THE SOLITUDE OF SELF. 461 

Such is the value of Hberal thought and broad culture, when shut off from 
all human companionship, bringing comfort and sunshine within even the 
four walls of a prison cell. As women oftentimes share a similar fate, should 
they not have all the consolation that the most liberal education can give? 
Their suffering in the prisons of St. Petersburgh; in the long weary marches 
to Siberia, and in the mines, working side by side with men, surely call for 
all the self-support that the most exalted sentiments of patriotism can give. 

When suddenly roused at midnight, with the startling cry of fire! fire! 
to find the house over their heads in flames, do women wait for men to point 
the way to safety? And are the men, equally bewildered and half suffocated 
with smoke, in a position to do more than try to save themselves? At such 
times the most timid women have shown a courage and heroism, in saving their 
husbands and children, that has surprised everybody. Inasmuch then as 
woman shares equally the joys and sorrows of time and eternity, is it not the 
height of presumption in man to propose to represent her at the ballot-box 
and the throne of grace, to do her voting in the State, her praying in the church, 
and to assume the position of High Priest at the family altar? 

Nothing strengthens the judgment and quickens the conscience like indi- 
vidual responsibility; nothing adds such dignity to character as the recognition 
of one's self-sovereignty; the right to an equal place everywhere conceded; a 
place earned by personal merit, not an artificial attainment, by inheritance, 
wealth, family, and position. Seeing, then, that the responsibilities of life rest 
equally on man and woman; that their destiny is the same, they need the same 
preparation. To talk of sheltering woman from the fierce storms of life 11 the 
sheerest mockery, for they beat on her from every point of the compass, just 
as they do on man, and with more fatal results, for he has been trained to 
protect himself, to resist, and conquer. Such are the facts in human experi- 
ence, the responsibiHties of individual sovereignty. Rich and poor, intelhgent 
and ignorant, wise and foolish, virtuous and vicious, man and woman, it is 
ever the same, each soul must depend wholly on itself. 

Whatever the theories may be of woman's dependence on man, in the 
supreme moments of her life he cannot bear her burdens. Alone she goes to 
the gates of death, to give life to every man that is born into the world; no 
one can share her fears; no one can mitigate her pangs, and if her sorrow 
is greater than she can bear, alone she passes beyond the gates into the vast 
unknown. 

From the mountain tops of Judea long ago, a heavenly voice bade his dis- 
ciples " bear ye one another's burdens," but humanity has not yet risen to 



462 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

that point of self-sacrifice, and if ever so willing, how few the burdens are that 
one soul can bear for another. In the highways of Palestine; in fasting and 
prayer on the solitary mountain tops; in the garden of Gethsemane; before the 
judgment seat of Pilate; betrayed by one of his trusted disciples at his last sup- 
per; in his agonies on the cross, even Jesus of Nazareth, in those last sad days 
on earth, felt the awful solitude of self. Deserted by man, in agony he cries, 
"My God! my God! why hast thou forsaken me?" And so it ever must be 
in the conflicting scenes of human life; in the long weary march, each one walks 
alone. We may nave many friends, love, kindness, sympathy, charity to 
smooth our pathway in everyday life, but in the tragedies that belong to all 
human experiences, each mortal stands alone. But when all artificial trammels 
are removed, and women are recognized as individuals, responsible for their 
own environments, thoroughly educated for all the positions in life they may 
be called to fill, with all the resources in themselves that liberal thought and 
broad culture can give; guided by their own conscience and judgment; trained 
to self-protection by a healthy development of the muscular system, and skill 
in the use of weapons of defense, and stimulated to self-support by a knowl- 
edge of the business world and the pleasure that pecuniary independence 
must ever give; when women are trained in this way, they will, in a measure, 
be fitted for those hours of solitude that come alike to all, whether prepared 
or otherwise. 

As in our extremities we must depend on ourselves, the dictates of wis- 
dom point to complete individual development. 

In talking of education, how shallow the argument that each class must 
be educated for the special work it proposes to do, and all those faculties not 
needed in this special work must lie dormant and utterly wither for want of 
use, when, perhaps, these will be the very faculties needed in life's greatest 
emergencies. Some say where is the use of drilling girls in the languages, 
the sciences, in law, medicine, theology. As wives, mothers, housekeepers, 
cooks, they need a different curriculum from boys, who are to fill all positions. 
The chief cooks in our great hotels and ocean steamers are men. In our 
large cities men run the bakeries; they make our bread, cake, and pies; they man- 
age the laundries; they are now considered our best milliners and dressmakers. 
Because some men fill these departments of usefulness, shall we reo-ulate the 
curriculum in Harvard and Yale to their present necessities? If not, why this 
talk in our best colleges of a curriculum for girls, who are crowding into the 
trades and professions; teachers in all our public schools; rapidly filling many 



THE SOLITUDE OF SELF. 463 

lucrative and honorable positions in life? They are showing, too, their calm- 
ness and courage in the most trying hours of human experience. 

You have probably all read in the daily papers of the late terrible storm 
in the Bay of Biscay, when a tidal wave made such havoc on the shore, wreck- 
ing vessels, unroofing houses, and carrying destruction everywhere. Among 
other buildings, the woman's prison was demolished. Those who escaped, 
standing on the beach, saw men struggling to reach the shore. They 
promptly, by clasping hands, made a chain of themselves and pushed out into 
the sea, again and again, at the risk of their lives, until they had brought six 
men to shore, carried them to a shelter, and did all in their power for their 
comfort and protection. What special school training could have prepared 
these women for this sublime moment in their lives? In times like this, human- 
ity rises above all college curriculums and recognizes Nature as the greatest of 
all teachers in the hour of danger and death. Women are already the equals 
of men in courage and heroism. In music they speak again the language 
of Mendelssohn, Beethoven, Chopin, Schurnann, and are worthy interpreters of 
their great thoughts. The poetry and novels of the century are theirs, and 
they have touched the keynote of reform in religion, politics, and social life. 
They fill the editor's and professor's chair, plead at the bar of justice, walk the 
wards of hospitals, and speak from the pulpit and the platform. Such is the 
type of womanhood that an enlightened public sentiment welcomes to-day; such 
the triumph of the facts of life over the false theories of the past. 

Is it then consistent to hold the developed woman of this day within the same 
narrow political limits as the dame with the spinning wheel and knitting needle 
occupied in the past? No! no! Machinery has taken the labors of women 
as well as men on its tireless shoulders; the loom and the spinning wheel are 
but dreams of the past; the pen, the brush, the easel, the chisel, have taken 
their places, while the hopes and ambitions of women are essentially changed. 

We see reason sufficient in the outer conditions of human beings for indi- 
vidual liberty and development, but when we consider the self-dependence of 
every human soul in all the tragedies of life, we see the need of courage, judg- 
ment, independence, skill in the exercise of every faculty of mind and body, 
strengthened and developed by use in woman, as well as man. 

Whatever may be said of man's protecting power in ordinary conditions, 
mid all the terrible disasters by land and sea, in the supreme moments of danger, 
alone woman must ever meet the horrors of the situation; the angel of death 
even makes no royal pathway for her. Man's love and svmpathy enter only 
into the sunshine of our lives. In that solemn solitude of self that links us 



464 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



with the immeasurable and the eternal, each soul lives alone forever. A recent 
writer says: "There is a solitude which each and every one of us has always 
carried with him, more inaccessible than the ice-cold mountains, more pro- 
found than the midnight sea; the solitude of self. Our inner being, which we 
call ourself, no eye nor touch of man or angel has ever pierced. It is more 
hidden than the caves of the gnome; the sacred adytum of the oracle; the hid- 
den chamber of eleucinian mystery, for to it only omniscience is permitted to 
enter." 

Such is individual life. Who, I ask you, can take, dare take, on him- 
self, the rights, the duties, the responsibilities, of another human soul? 



(Speech delivered January 18, li 



before Committee on Judiciary, Washington, D. C.) 







ilj'i^' % 



THE CROSS OF GOLD. 



465 



The Cross of Gold. 

By WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN, of Nebraska. 

(Born i860.) 




R. CHAIRMAN AND GENTLEMEN OF THE CONVENTION: 
I would be presumptious, indeed, to present myself against the 
distinguished gentlemen to whom you have listened if this were a 
mere measuring of abilities; but this is not a contest between persons. 
The humblest citizen in all the land, when clad in the armor of a 
righteous cause, is stronger than all the hosts of error. I come to 
speak to you in defense of a cause as holy as the cause of liberty — the cause of 
humanity. 

When this debate is concluded, a motion will be made to lay upon the 
table the resolution offered in commendation of the administration, and also the 
resolution offered in condemnation of the Administration. We object to bring- 
ing this question down to the level of persons. The individual is but an atom; 
he is born, he acts, he dies; but principles are eternal; arid this has been a 
contest over a principle. 

Never before in the history of this country has there been witnessed such 
a contest as that through which we have just passed. Never before in the 
history of American politics has a great issue been fought out as this issue has 
been, by the voters of a great party. On the fourth of March, 1895, a few 
Democrats, most of them members of Congress, issued an address to the Demo- 
crats of the Nation, asserting that the money question was the paramount issue 
of the hour; declaring that a majority of the Democratic party had the right 
to control the action of the party on this paramount issue; and concluding with 
the request that the believers in the free coinage of silver in the Democratic 
party should organize, take charge of, and control the policy of the Democratic 
party. Three days later, at Memphis, an organization was perfected, and the 
silver Democrats went forth openly and courageously proclaiming their belief, 
and declaring that, if successful, they would crystallize into a platform the' 
declaration which they had made. Then began the conflict. With a zeal 
approaching the zeal which inspired the crusaders who followed Peter the 



466 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Hermit, our silver Democrats went forth from victory unto victory until they 
are now assembled, not to discuss, not to debate, but to enter up the judgment 
already rendered by the plain people of this country. In this contest brother 
has been arrayed against brother, father against son. The warmest ties of 
love, acquaintance, and association have been disregarded ; old leaders have been 
cast aside when they have refused to give expression to the sentiments of those 
whom they would lead, and new leaders have sprung up to give direction to 
this cause of truth. Thus has the contest been waged, and we have assembled 
here under as binding and solemn instructions as were ever imposed upon rep- 
resentatives of the people. 

We do not come as individuals. As individuals we might have been glad 
to compliment the gentleman from New York (Senator Hill), but we know 
that the people for whom we speak would never be willing to put him in a 
position where he could thwart the will of the Democratic party. I say it was 
not a question of persons; it was a question of principle, and it is not with 
gladness, my friends, that we find ourselves brought into conflict with those 
who are now arrayed on the other side. 

The gentleman who preceded me (ex-Governor Russell) spoke of the State 
of Massachusetts; let me assure him that not one present in all this convention 
entertains the least hostility to the people of the State of Massachusetts, but 
we stand here representing people who are the equals, before the law, of the 
greatest citizens in the State of Massachusetts. When you (turning to the 
gold delegates) come before us and tell us that we are about to disturb your 
business interests, we reply that you have disturbed our business interests by 
your course. 

We say to you that you have made the definition of a business man too 
limited in its application. The man who is employed for wages is as much a 
business man as his employer; the attorney in a country town is as nuich a 
business man as the corporation counsel in a great metropolis; the merchant 
at the cross-roads store is as much a business man as the merchant of New 
York; the farmer who goes forth in the morning and toils all day — who begins 
in the spring and toils all summer — and who by the application of brain and 
muscle to the natural resources of the country creates wealth, is as much a 
business man as the man who goes upon the board of trade and bets upon 
the price of grain; the miners who go down a thousand feet into the earth, or 
climb two thousand feet upon the cliffs, and bring forth from their hiding 
places the precious metals to be poured into the channels of trade are as much 
business men as the few financial magnates who, in a back room, corner the 
money of the world. We come to speak for this broader class of business men. 




William Jennings Bryan. 



468 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Ah, my friends, we say not one word against those who live upon the 
Atlantic coast, but the hardy pioneers who have braved all the dangers of the 
wilderness, who have made the desert to blossom as the rose — the pioneers 
away out there (pointing to the West), who rear their children near to Nature's 
heart, where they can mingle their voices with the voices of the birds — out 
there where they have erected schoolhouses for the education of their young, 
churches where they praise their Creator, and cemeteries where rest the ashes 
of their dead — these people, we say, are as deserving of the consideration of 
our party as any people in this country. It is for these that we speak. We 
do not come as aggressors. Our war is not a war of conquest; we are fighting 
in the defense of our homes, our families, and posterity. We have petitioned, 
and our petitions have been scorned; we have entreated, and our entreaties 
have been disregarded; we have begged, and they have mocked when our 
calamity came. We beg no longer; we entreat no more; we petition no more. 
We defy them. 

The gentleman from Wisconsin has said that he fears a Robespierre. My 
friends, in this land of the free you need not fear that a tyrant will spring up 
from among the people. What we need is an Andrew Jackson to stand, as 
Jackson stood, against the encroachments of organized wealth. 

They tell us that this platform was made to catch votes. We reply to them 
that changing conditions make new issues; that the principles upon which 
Democracy rests are as everlasting as the hills, but that they must be applied 
to new conditions as they arise. Conditions have arisen, and we are here to 
meet those conditions. They tell us that the income tax ought not to be brought 
in here; that it is a new idea. They criticise us for our criticism of the Supreme 
Court of the United States. My friends, we have not criticised; we have sim- 
ply called attention to what you already know. If you want criticisms, read 
the dissenting opinions of the court. There you will find criticisms. They say 
that we passed an unconstitutional law; we deny it. The income tax law was 
not unconstitutional when it was passed; it was not unconstitutional when it 
went before the Supreme Court for the first time; it did not become unconsti- 
tutional until one of the judges changed his mind, and we cannot be expected 
to know when a judge will change his mind. The income tax is just. It 
simply intends to put the burdens of Government justly upon the backs of 
the people. I am in favor of an income tax. When I find a man who is not 
willing to bear his share of the burdens of the Government which protects him, 
I find a man who is unworthy to enjoy the blessings of a Government like ours. 

They say that we are opposing national bank currency; it is true. If you 
will read what Thomas Benton said, you will find he said that, in searching 



THE CROSS OF GOLD. 469 

history, he could find but one parallel to Andrew Jackson; that was Cicero, 
who destroyed the conspiracy of Cataline and saved Rome. Benton said that 
Cicero only did for Rome what Jackson did for us when he destroyed the bank 
conspiracy and saved America. We say in our platform that we believe that 
the right to coin and issue money is a function of Government. We believe it. 
We believe that it is a part of sovereignty, and can no more with safety be 
delegated to private individuals than we could afford to delegate to private 
individuals the power to make penal statutes or levy taxes. Mr. Jefferson, 
who was once regarded as good Democratic authority, seems to have differed 
in opinion from the gentleman who has addressed us on the part of the 
minority. Those who are opposed to this proposition tell us that the issue of 
paper money is a function of the bank, and that the Government ought to go 
out of the banking business. I stand with Jefferson rather than with them, 
and tell them, as he did, that the issue of money is a function of Government, 
and that the banks ought to go out of the governing business. 

They complain about the plank which declares against life tenure in office. 
They have tried to strain it to mean that which it does not mean. What we 
oppose by that plank is the life tenure which is being built up in W^ashington, 
and which excludes from participation in official benefits the humbler members 
of society. 

Let me call your attention to two or three important things. The gentle- 
man from New York says that he will propose an amendment to the platform 
providing that the proposed change in our monetary system shall not affect 
contracts already made. Let me remind you that there is no intention of affect- 
ing those contracts which according to present laws are made payable in gold; 
but if he means to say that we cannot change our monetary system without 
protecting those who have loaned money before the change was made, I 
desire to ask him where, in law or in morals, he can find justification for not 
protecting the debtors when the act of 1873 was passed, if he now insists that 
we must protect the creditors. 

He says he will also propose an amendment which will provide for the 
suspension of free coinage if we fail to maintain the parity within a year. We 
reply that when we advocate a policy which we believe will be successful, we 
are not compelled to raise a doubt as to our own sincerity by suggesting what 
we shall do if we fail. I ask him, if he would apply his logic to us, why he 
does not apply it to himself. He says he wants this country to try to secure 
an international agreement. Why does he not tell us what he is going to do 
if he fails to secure an international agreement? There is more reason for him 
to do that than there is for us to provide against the failure to maintain the 



470 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

parity. Our opponents have tried for twenty years to secure an international 
agreement, and those are waiting for it most patiently who do not want it at all. 

And now, my friends, let me come to the paramount issue. If they ask 
us why it is that we say more on the money question than we say upon the 
tariff question, I reply that, if protection has slain its thousands, the gold 
standard has slain its tens of thousands. If they ask us why we do not embody 
in our platform all the things that we believe in, we reply that when we have 
restored the money of the Constitution all other necessary reforms will be pos- 
sible; but that until this is done there is no other reform that can be 
accomplished. 

Why is it that within three months such a change has come over the 
country? Three months ago, when it was confidently asserted that those who 
believe in the gold standard would frame our platform and nominate our can- 
didates, even the advocates of the gold standard did not think that we could 
elect a President. And they had good reason for their doubt, because there is 
scarcely a State here to-day asking for the gold standard which is not in the 
absolute control of the Republican party. But note the change. Mr. McKin- 
ley was nominated in St. Louis upon a platform which declared for the main- 
tenance of the gold standard until it can be changed into bimetallism by inter- 
national agreement. Mr. McKinley was the most popular man among the 
Republicans, and three months ago everybody in the Republican party prophe- 
sied his election. How is it to-day? \\'hy, the man who was once pleased to 
think that he looked like Napoleon — that man shudders to-day when he 
remembers that he was nominated on the anniversary of the battle of Waterloo. 
Not only that, but as he listens he can hear with ever-increasing distinctness 
the sound of the waves as they beat upon the lonely shores of St. Helena. 

Why this change? Ah, my friends, is not the reason for the change evi- 
dent to any one who will look at the matter? No private character, however 
pure, no personal popularity, however great, can protect from the avenging 
wrath of an indignant people a man who will declare that he is in favor of 
fastening the gold standard upon this country, or who is willing to surrender 
the right of self-government and place the legislative control of our afifairs 
in the hands of foreign potentates and powers. 

We go forth confident that we shall win. Why? Because upon the para- 
mount issue of this campaign there is not a spot of ground upon which the 
enemy will dare to challenge battle. If they tell us that the gold standard is 
a good thing, we shall point to their platform and tell them that their platform 
pledges the party to get rid of the gold standard and substitute bimetallism. 
If the gold standard is a good thing, why try to get rid of it? I call your 



THE CROSS OF GOLD. 471 

attention to the fact that some of the very people who are in this convention 
to-day and who tell us that we ought to declare in favor of international bimet- 
allism ■ — ■ thereby declaring that the gold standard is wrong and that the prin- 
ciple of bimetallism is better — these very people four months ago were open 
and avowed advocates of the gold standard, and were then telling us that we 
could not legislate two metals together, even with the aid of all the world. If 
the gold standard is a good thing, we ought to declare in favor of its retention 
and not in favor of abandoning it; and if the gold standard is a bad thing why 
should we wait until other nations are willing to help us to let go? Here is 
the line of battle, and we care not upon which issue they force the fight; we 
are prepared to meet them on either issue or on both. If they tell us that the 
gold standard is the standard of civilization, we reply to them that this, the 
most enlightened of all the nations of the earth, has never declared for a gold 
standard and that both the great parties this year are declaring against it. If 
the gold standard is the standard of civilization, why, my friends, should we 
not have it? If they come to meet us on that issue we can present the history 
of our Nation. More than that; we can tell them that they will search the pages 
of history in vain to find a single instance where the common people of any 
land have ever declared themselves in favor of the gold standard. They can 
find where the holders of fixed investments have declared for a gold standard, 
but not where the masses have. 

Mr. Carlisle said in 1878 that this was a struggle between " the idle hold- 
ers of idle capital " and " the struggling masses, who produce the wealth and 
pay the taxes of the country," and, my friends, the question we are to decide is: 
Upon which side will the Democratic party fight; upon the side of "the idle 
holders of idle capital " or upon the side of " the struggling masses? " That 
is the question which the party must answer first, and then it must be answered 
by each individual hereafter. The sympathies of the Democratic party, as 
shown by the platform, are on the side of the struggling masses who have ever 
been the foundation of the Democratic party. There are two ideas of govern- 
ment. There are those who believe that, if you will only legislate to make the 
well-to-do prosperous, their prosperity will leak through on those below. The 
Democratic idea, however, has been that if you legislate to make the masses 
prosperous, their prosperity will find its way up through every class which rests 
upon them. 

You come to us and tell us that the great cities are in favor of the gold 
standard; we reply that the great cities rest upon our broad and fertile prairies. 
Burn down your cities and leave our farms, and your cities will spring up again 



472 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

as if by magic; but destroy our farms and the grass will grow in the streets 
of every city in the country. 

My friends, we declare that this Nation is able to legislate for its own 
people on every question, without waiting for the aid or consent of any other 
nation on earth ; and upon that issue we expect to carry every State in the 
Union. I shall not slander the inhabitants of the fair State of Massachusetts 
nor the inhabitants of the State of New York by saying that, when they are 
confronted with the proposition, they will declare that this Nation is not able 
to attend to its own business. It is the issue of 1776 over again. Our ances- 
tors, when but three millions in number, had the courage to declare their 
political independence of every other nation; shall we, their descendants, when 
we have grown to seventy millions, declare that we are less independent than 
our forefathers? No, my friends, that will never be the verdict of our people. 
Therefore, we care not upon what lines the battle is fought. If they say bimet- 
allism is good, but that we cannot have it until other nations help us, we reply 
that, instead of having a gold standard because England has, we will restore 
bimetallism, and then let England have bimetallism because the United States 
has it. If they dare to come out in the open field and defend the gold standard 
as a good thing, we will fight them to the uttermost. Having behind us the 
producing masses of this Nation and the world, supported by the commercial 
•interests, the laboring interests, and the toilers everywhere, we will answer 
their demand for a gold standard by saying to them : You shall not press down 
upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns, you shall not crucify mankind 
upon a cross of gold. 

(Concluding the debate on the Democratic Platform; delivered at Chicago, 1896.) 





THE BLACK MAN. 473 



The Black Man. 

By FREDERICK DOUGLASS, of Maryland. 

(Born 1817, died 1895.) 



iHE Constitution knows no man by the color of his skin. The men 
who made it were too noble for any such limitation of humanity and 
human rights. The word ' white ' is a modern term in the legis- 
lation of this country. It was never used in the better days of our 
Republic, but has sprung up within the period of our national degen- 
eracy." * * * "I am here simply as an American citizen, hav- 
ing a stake in the weal or woe of the Nation in common with other citizens. I 
am not even here as the agent of any sect or party. Parties are too politic 
and sects are too sectarian, to select one of my odious class, and of my radical 
opinions, at this important time and place to represent them. Nevertheless, I 
do not stand alone here. There are noble-minded men in Illinois who are 
neither ashamed of their cause nor their company. Some of them are here 
to-night, and I expect to meet with them in every part of the State where I may 
travel. But, I pray, hold no man or party responsible for my words, for I am 
no man's agent, and I am. no party's agent." * * * " |^ {§ alleged that I 
am come to this State to insult Senator Douglas. Among gentlemen that is 
only art insult which is intended to be such, and I disavow all such intention. 
I am not even here with the desire to meet in public debate that gentleman. 
I am here precisely as I was in this State one year ago — with no other change 
in my relations to you, or to the great question of human freedom, than time 
and circumstances have brought about. I shall deal with the subject with the 
same spirit now as then, approving such men and such measures as look to the 
security of liberty in the land, and with my whole heart condemning all such 
men and measures, as serve to subvert or endanger it. If Hon. S. A. Douglas, 
your beloved and highly-gifted Senator, has designedly, or through mistaken 
notions of public policy, ranged himself on the side of oppressors and the 
deadliest enemies of liberty, I know of no reason, either in this world or in any 
other world, which should prevent me, or prevent any one else, from thinking 
so, or from saying so. 



474 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

" The people in whose cause I come here to-night are not among those 
whose right to regulate their own domestic concerns is so feelingly, and ear- 
nestly, and eloquently contended for in certain quarters. They have no Stephen 
Arnold Douglas — no General Cass, to contend at North Market Hall for their 
popular sovereignty. They have no national purse, no offices, no reputation, 
with which to corrupt Congress, or to tempt men, mighty in eloquence and 
influence, into their service. Oh, no! They have nothing to commend them 
but their unadorned humanity. They are human — that's all — only human. 
Nature owns them as human — God owns them as human; but men own them 
as property, and only as property. Every right of human nature, as such, is 
denied them; they are dumb in their chains. To utter one groan or scream 
for freedom in the presence of the Southern advocate of popular sovereignty, 
is to bring down the frightful lash upon their quivering flesh. I know this 
suffering people; I am acquainted with their sorrows; I am one with them in 
experience; I have felt the lash of the slave-driver, and stand up here with all 
the bitter recollection of its horrors vividly upon me. 

" There are special reasons why I should speak, and speak freely. Tlie 
right of speech is a very precious one. I understand that Mr. Douglas regards 
himself as the most abused man in the United States; and that the .greatest 
outrage ever committed upon him was in the case in which your indignation 
raised your voices so high that his could not be heard. No personal violence, 
as I understand, was ofifered him. It seems to have been a trial of vocal 
powers between the individual and the multitude; and, as might have been 
expected, the voice of one man was not equal in volume to the voices of five 
thousand. I do not mention this circumstance to approve it; I do not approve 
il. I am for free speech, as well as for free men and free soil; but how ineffably 
insignificant is this wrong done in a single instance, compared to the stupen- 
dous iniquity perpetrated against more than three millions of the American 
people, who are struck dumb by the very men in whose cause Mr. Senator 
Douglas was here to plead! While I would not approve the silencing of 
Mr. Douglas, may we not hope that this slight abridgment of his rights may 
lead him to respect in some degree the rights of other men, as good in the 
eye of Heaven as himself? 

" Let us now consider the great question of the age, the only great national 
question which seriously agitates the public mind at this hour. It is called 
the vexed question, and excites alarm in every quarter of the country. * * * 

" The proposition to repeal the Missouri Compromise was a stunning one. 
It fell upon the Nation like a bolt from a cloudless sky. The thing was too 
startling for belief. You believed in the South; and you believed in the North; 



THE BLACK MAN. 475 

and you knew that the repeal of the Missouri Compromise was a breach of 
honor; and, therefore, you said that the thing could not be done. Besides, both 
parties had pledged themselves directly, positively, and solemnly against reopen- 
ing in Congress the agitation on the subject of slavery; and the President 
himself had declared his intention to maintain the national quiet. Upon these 
assurances you rested, and rested fatally. But you should have learned long 
ago that men do not ' gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles.' It is folly 
to put faith in men who have broken faith with God. When a man has brought 
himself to enslave a child of God, to put fetters on his brother, he has qualified 
himself to disregard the most sacred of compacts; beneath the sky there is 
nothing more sacred than man, and nothing can be properly respected when 
manhood is despised and trampled upon. * * * 

" It is said that slavery is the creature of positive law, and that it can only 
exist where it is sustained by positive law — that neither in Kansas nor 
Nebraska is there any law establishing slavery and that, therefore, the moment 
a slave-holder carries his slave into those territories, he is free and restored to 
the rights of human nature. This is the ground taken by General Cass. He 
contended for it in the North Market Hall, with much eloquence and skill. I 
thought, while I was hearing him on this point, that slave-holders would not 
be likely to thank him for the argument. Theoretically the argument is good; 
practically the argument is bad. It is not true that slavery cannot exist with- 
out being established by positive law. The instance cannot be shown where 
a law was ever made establishing slavery, where the relation of master and slave 
did not previously exist. The law is always an after-coming consideration. 
Wicked men first overpower, and subdue their fellow-men to slavery, and then 
call in the law to sanction the deed. Even in the slave States of America, 
slavery has never been established by positive law. It was not established 
under the colonial charters of the original States, nor the Constitutions of the 
States. It is now, and has always been, a system of lawless violence. On this 
proposition I hold myself ready and willing to meet any defender of the 
Nebraska Bill. I would not even hesitate to meet the author of that bill 
himself. * * * 

" He says he wants no broad, black line across this continent. Such a 
line is odious, and begets unkind feelings between the citizens of a common 
country. Now, fellow-citizens, why is the line of thirty-six degrees thirty 
minutes a broad, black line? What is it that entitles it to be called a black 
line? It is the fashion to call whatever is odious in this country, black. You 
call the devil black, and he may be; but what is there in the line of thirty-six 
degrees thirty minutes which makes it blacker than the line which separates 



476 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Illinois from Missouri, or Michigan from Indiana? I can see nothing in the 
line itself which should make it black or odious. It is a line, that's all. If 
it is black, black and odious, it must be so, not because it is a line, but because 
of the things it separates. If it keeps asunder what God has joined together — 
or separates what God intended should be fused, then it may be called an 
odious line, a black line; but if, on the other hand, it marks only a distinction 
natural and eternal, a distinction fixed in the nature of things by the eternal 
God, then I say, withered be the arm and blasted be the hand that would blot 
it out. * * * 

" Nothing could be further from the truth, than to say that popular sov- 
ereignty is accorded to the people who may settle the territories of Kansas and 
Nebraska. The three great cardinal powers of government are the executive, 
legislative, and judicial. Are these powers secured to the people of Kansas 
and Nebraska? You know they are not. That bill places the people of that 
territory as completely under the powers of the Federal Government as Canada 
is under the British crown. By this Kansas-Nebraska Bill the Federal Gov- 
ernment has the substance of all governing power, while the people have the 
shadow. The judicial power of the territories is not from the people of the 
territories, who are so bathed in the sunlight of popular sovereignty by stump 
eloquence, but from the Federal Government. The executive power of the 
territories derives its existence not from the overflowing fountain of popular 
sovereignty, but from the Federal Government. The secretaries of the terri- 
tories are not appointed by the sovereign people of the territories, but are 
appointed independently of popular sovereignty. 

" But is there nothing in this bill which justifies the supposition that it 
contains the principle of popular sovereignty? No, not one word. Even the 
territorial councils, elected, not by the people who may settle in the territories, 
but by only certain descriptions of people, are subject to a double veto power, 
vested first in a Governor, whom they did not elect, and second in the President 
of the United States. The only shadow of popular sovereignty is the power 
given to the people of the territories by this bill to have, hold, buy, and sell 
human beings. The sovereign right to make slaves of his fellow-men, if they 
choose, is the only sovereignty that the bill secures. In all else, popular sov- 
ereignty means only what the boy meant, when he said he was going to live 
with his uncle Robert. He said he was going there, and that he meant while 
there to do just what he pleased, if his uncle Robert would let him. * * * 

" But it may be said that Congress has the right to allow the people of 
the territories to hold slaves. The answer is, that Congress is made up of men, 
and possesses only the right of men; and unless it can be shown that some 



THE BLACK MAN. ' 477 

men have a right to hold their fellow-men as property, Congress has no such 
right. There is not a man within the sound of my voice, who has not as good 
a right to enslave a brother man, as Congress has. This will not be denied 
even by slave-holders. Then I put the question to you, each of you, all of 
you, have you any such right? To admit such a right is to charge God with 
folly, to substitute anarchy for order, and to turn earth into a hell. And you 
know better. Now, friends and fellow-citizens, I am uttering no new senti- 
ments at this point, and am making no new argument. In this respect there 
is nothing new under the sun. 

" Error may be new, or it may be old, since it is founded in a misappre- 
hension of what truth is. It has its beginnings; and it has its endings. But 
not so with truth. Truth is eternal. Like the great God, from whose throne 
it emanates, it is from everlasting unto everlasting, and can never pass away. 
Such a truth is a man's right to freedom. He was born with it. It was his 
before he comprehended it. The title-deed to it is written by the Almighty 
on his heart; and the record of it is in the bosom of the Eternal; and never 
can Stephen A. Douglas efface it, unless he can tear from the great heart of 
God this truth; and this mighty Government of ours will never be at peace 
with God, unless it shall, practically and universally, embrace this great truth 
as the foundation of all its institutions, and the rule of its entire administra- 
tion. Now, gentlemen — I have done. I have no fear for the ultimate triumph 
of free principles in this country. The signs of the times are propitious. Vic- 
tories have been won by slavery; but they have never been won against the 
onward march of anti-slavery principles. The progress of these principles has 
been constant, steady, strong, and certain. Every victory won by slavery has 
had the effect to fling our principles more widely and favorably among the 
people. The annexation of Texas — the Florida war — the war with Mexico — 
the compromise measures, and the repeal of the Missouri Compromise have 
all signally vindicated the wisdom of the great God, who has promised to over- 
rule the wickedness of men for His own glory — to confound the wisdom of 
the crafty and bring to naught the counsels of the ungodly." 

(From a speech delivered in Cliicago in 1854.) 




478 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



The Soul's Providence. 

By RALPH WALDO EMERSON, of Massachusetts. 

(Born 1803, died 1882.) 



N this refulgent summer, it has been a luxury- to draw the breath of 
life. The grass grows, the buds burst, the meadow is spotted with 
fire and gold in the tint of flowers. The air is full of birds, and sweet 
with the breath of the pine, the balm-of-Gilead, and the new hay. 
Night brings no gloom to the heart with its welcome shade. Through 
the transparent darkness the stars pour their almost spiritual rays. 
Man under them seems a young child, and his huge globe a toy. The cool 
night bathes the world as with a river, and prepares his eyes again for the 
crimson dawn. The mystery of nature was never displayed more happily. 
The corn and the wine have been freely dealt to all creatures, and the never- 
broken silence with which the old bountv goes forward, has not yielded yet 
one word of explanation. One is constrained to respect the perfection of this 
world, in which our senses converse. How wide; how rich; what invitation 
from every property it gives to every faculty of- man! In its fruitful soils; in 
its navigable sea; in its mountains of metal and stone; in its forests of all 
woods; in its animals; in its chemical ingredients; in the powers and path of 
light, heat, attraction, and life, it is well worth the pith and heart of great 
men to subdue and enjoy it. The planters, the mechanics, the inventors, the 
astronomers, the builders of cities, and the ca]:)tains. history delights to honor. 
But when the mind opens, and reveals the laws which traverse the uni- 
verse, and make things what they are, then shrinks the great world at once 
into a mere illustration and fable of this mind. What am I? and What is? 
asks the human spirit with a curiosity new-kindled, but never to be quenched. 
Behold these outrunning laws, which our imperfect apprehension can see 
tend this way and that, but not come full circle. Behold these infinite rela- 
tions, so like, so unlike; many, yet one. I would study, I would know, I 
would admire forever. These works of thought have been the entertainments 
of the human spirit in all ages. 

A more secret, sweet, and overpowering beauty appears to man when his 
heart and mind open to the sentiment of virtue. Then he is instructed in 




Ralph Waldo Emerson. 



48o MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Avhat is above him. He learns that his being is without bound; that, to the 
good, to the perfect, he is born, low as he now lies in evil and weakness. 
That which he venerates is still his own, though he has not realized it yet. 
He ought. He knows the sense of that grand word, though his analysis fails 
entirely to render account of it. When in innocency, or when by intellectual 
perception, he attains to say, — " I love the Right; Truth is beautiful within 
and without, forevermore. Virtue, I am thine: save me: use me: thee will I 
serve, day and night, in great, in small, that I may be not virtuous, but virtue; " 
— then is the end of the creation answered, and God is well pleased. 

The sentiment of virtue is a reverence and delight in the presence of cer- 
tain divine laws. It perceives that this homely game of life we play, covers, 
under what seemed foolish details, principles that astonish. The child amidst his 
baubles, is learning the action of light, motion, gravity, muscular force; and 
in the game of human life, love, fear, justice, appetite, man, and God, interact. 
These laws refuse to be adequately stated. Tliey will not be written out on 
paper, or spoken by the tongue. They elude our persevering thought; yet we 
read them hourly in each other's faces, in each other's actions, in our own 
remorse. The moral traits which are all globed into every virtuous act and 
thought, — in speech, we must sever, and describe or suggest by painful enu- 
meration of many particulars. Yet, as this sentiment is the essence of all religion, 
let me guide your eye to the precise objects of the sentiment, by an enumera- 
tion of some of those classes of facts in which this element is conspicuous. 

The intuition of the moral sentiment is an insight of the perfection of the 
laws of the soul. These laws execute themselves. They are out of time, out 
of space, and not subject to circumstance. Thus; in the soul of man there 
is a justice whose retributions are instant and entire. He who does a good 
deed, is instantly ennobled. He who does a mean deed, is by the action itself 
contracted. He who puts off impurity, thereby puts on purity. If a man is 
at heart just, then in so far is he God; the safety of God, the immortality of 
God, the majesty of God do enter into that man with justice. If a man dis- 
semble, deceive, he deceives himself, and goes out of acquaintance with his 
own being. A man in the view of absolute goodness, adores, with total humil- 
ity. Every step so downward, is a step upward. The man who renounces him- 
self, comes to himself. 

See how this rapid intrinsic energy worketh everywhere, righting wrongs, 
correcting appearances, and bringing up facts to a harmony with thoughts. 
Its operation in life, though slow to the senses, is, at last, as sure as in the 
soul. By it, a man is made the Providence to himself, dispensing good to his 
goodness, and evil to his sin. Character is always known. Thefts never 



THE SOUL'S PROVIDENCE. 481 

enrich; alms never impoverish; murder will speak out of stone walls. The 
least admixture of a lie, — for example, the taint of vanity, the least attempt to 
make a good impression, a favorable appearance, — will instantly vitiate the 
effect. But speak the truth, and all nature and all spirits help you with unex- 
pected furtherance. Speak the truth, and all things alive or brute are vouch- 
ers, and the very roots of the grass underground there, do seem to stir and 
move to bear you witness. See again the perfection of the Law as it applies 
itself to the affections, and becomes the law of society. As we are, so we 
associate. The good, by affinity, seek the good; the vile, by affinity, the vile. 
Thus of their own volition, souls proceed into heaven, into hell. 

These facts have always suggested to man the sublime creed that the 
world is not the product of manifold power, but of one will, of one mind; 
and that one mind is everywhere active, in each ray of the star, in each wavelet 
of the pool; and whatever opposes that will, is everywhere balked and baffled, 
because things are made so, and not otherwise. Good is positive. Evil is 
merely privative, not absolute; it is like cold, which is the privation of heat. 
All evil is so much death or nonentity. Benevolence is absolute and real. So 
much benevolence as a man hath, so much life hath he. For all things pro- 
ceed out of this same spirit, which is differently named love, justice, temperance, 
in its different applications, just as the ocean receives different names on the 
several shores which it washes. All things proceed out of the same spirit, and 
all things conspire with it. Whilst a man seeks good ends, he is strong by 
the whole strength of nature. In so far as he roves from these ends, he 
bereaves himself of power, of auxiliaries; his being shrinks out of all remote 
channels, he becomes less and less, a mote, a point, until absolute badness is 
absolute death. 

The perception of this law of laws awakens in the mind a sentiment which 
we call the religious sentiment, and which makes our highest happiness. Won- 
derful is its power to charm and to command. It is a mountain air. It is the 
embalmer of the world. It is myrrh, and storax, and chlorine and rosemary. 
It makes the sky and the hills sublime, and the silent song of the stars is it. 
By it, is the universe made safe and habitable, not by science or power. 
Thought may work cold and intransitive in things, and find no end or unity; 
but the dawn of the sentiment of virtue on the heart, gives and is the assurance 
that Law is sovereign over all natures; and the worlds, time, space, eternity, do 
seem to break out into joy. 

This sentiment is divine and deifying. It is the beatitude of man. It 
makes him illimitable. Through it, the soul first knows itself. It corrects the 
capital mistake of the infant man, wht) seeks to be great by following the great. 



482 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

and hopes to derive advantages from another, — by showing the fountain of all 
good to be in himself, and that he, equally with every man, is an inlet into the 
deeps of Reason. When he says, " I ought; " when love warms him; when he 
chooses, warned from on high, the good and great deed; then, deep melodies 
wander through his soul from Supreme Wisdom. Then he can worship, and 
be enlarged by his worship; for he can never go behind this sentiment. In 
the sublimest flights of the soul, rectitude is never surmounted, love is never 
outgrown. 

This sentiment lies at the foundation of society, and successively creates 
all forms of worship. The principle of veneration never dies out. Man fallen 
into superstition, into sensuality, is never quite without the visions of the moral 
sentiment. In like manner, all the expressions of this sentiment are sacred 
and permanent in proportion to their purity. The expressions of this senti- 
ment afifect us more than all other compositions. The sentences of the oldest 
time, which ejaculate this piety, are still fresh and fragrant. This thought 
dwelled always deepest in the minds of men in the devout and contemplative 
East; not alone in Palestine, where it reached its purest expression, but in 
Egypt, in Persia, in India, in China. Europe has always owed to Oriental 
genius, its divine impulses. What these holy bards said, all sane men found 
agreeable and true. And the unique impression of Jesus upon mankind, whose 
name is not so much written as ploughed into the history of this world, is 
proof of the subtle virtue of this infusion. 

Meantime, whilst the doors of the temple stand open, night and day, 
before every man, and the oracles of this truth cease never, it is guarded by 
one stern condition; this, namely; it is an intuition. It cannot be received at 
second hand. Truly speaking, it is not instruction, but provocation, that I can 
receive from another soul. What he announces. I must find true in me, or 
wholly reject; and on his word, or as his second, be he who he may, I can 
accept nothing. On the contrary, the absence of this primary faith is the 
presence of degradation. As is the flood so is the ebb. Let this faith depart, 
and the very words it spake, and the things it made, become false and hurtful. 
Then falls the church, the state, art, letters, life. The doctrine of the divine 
nature being forgotten, a sickness infects and dwarfs the constitution. Once 
man was all; now he is an appendage, a nuisance. And because the indwelling 
Supreme Spirit cannot wholly be got rid of, the doctrine of it sufifers this per- 
version, that the divine nature is attributed to one or two persons, and denied 
to all the rest, and denied with fury. The doctrine of inspiration is lost; the 
base doctrine of the majority of voices, usurps the place of the doctrine of the 
soul. Miracles, prophecy, poetry; the ideal life, the holy life, exist as ancient 



THE SOUL'S PROVIDENCE. 483 

history merely; they are not in the belief, nor in the aspiration of society; but, 
when suggested, seem ridiculous. Life is comic or pitiful, as soon as the high 
ends of being fade out of sight, and man becomes near-sighted, and can only 
attend to what addresses the senses. 

These general views, which, whilst they are general, none will contest, 
find abundant illustration in the history of religion, and especially in the his- 
tory of the Christian church. In that, all of us have had our birth and nurture. 
The truth contained in that, you, my young friends, are now setting forth to 
teach. As the Cultus, or established worship of the civilized world, it has 
great historical interest for us. Of its blessed words, which have been the con- 
solation of humanity, you need not that I should speak. I shall endeavor to 
discharge my duty to you, on this occasion, by pointing out two errors in its 
administration, which daily appear more gross from the point of view we have 
just now taken. 

Jesus Christ belonged to the true race of prophets. He saw with open eye 
the mystery of the soul. Drawn by its severe harmony, ravished with its 
beauty, he lived in it, and had his being there. Alone in all history, he esti- 
mated the greatness of man. One man was true to what is in you and me. 
He saw that God incarnates himself in man, and evermore goes forth anew 
to take possession of his world. He said, in this jubilee of sublime emotion, 
" I am divine. Through me, God acts; through me, speaks. Would you see 
God, see- me; or, see thee, when thou also thinkest as I now think." But what 
a distortion did his doctrine and memory suffer in the same, in the next, and 
the following ages! There is no doctrine of the Reason which will bear to 
be taught by the Understanding. The understanding caught this high chant 
from the poet's lips, and said, in the next age, " This was Jehovah come down 
out of heaven. I will kill you, if you say he was a man." The idioms of his 
language, and the figures of his rhetoric, have usurped the place of his truth; 
and churches are not built on his principles, but on his tropes. Christianity 
became a Mythus, as the poetic teaching of Greece and of Egypt, before. 
He spoke of miracles; for he felt that man's life was a miracle, and all that 
man doth, and he knew that this daily miracle shines, as the character ascends. 
But the word Miracle, as pronounced by Christian churches, gives a false 
impression. It is not one with the blowing clover and the falling rain. * * ^ 

That is always best which gives me to myself. The sublime is excited in 
me by the great stoical doctrine. Obey thyself. That which shows God in me, 
fortifies me. That which shows God out of me, makes me a wart and a wen. 
There is no longer a necessary reason for my being. Already the long shadows 
of untimely oblivion creep over me, and I shall decrease forever. 



484 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

The divine bards are the friends of my virtue, of my intellect, of my 
strength. They admonish me, that the gleams which flash across my mind, are 
not mine, but God's; that they had the like, and were not disobedient to the 
heavenly vision. So I love them. Noble provocations go out from them, 
inviting me to resist evil; to subdue the world; and to Be. And thus by his 
holy thoughts, Jesus serves us, and thus only. * * * 

Preaching is the expression of the moral sentiment in application to the 
duties of life. In how many churches, by how many prophets, tell me, is 
man made sensible that he is an infinite Soul; that the earth and heavens are 
passing into his mind; that he is drinking forever the soul of God? Where 
now sounds the persuasion, that by its very melody imparadises my heart, and 
so afilirms its own origin in heaven? Where shall I hear words such as in 
elder ages drew men to leave all and follow, — father and mother, house and 
land, wife and child? Where shall I hear these august laws of moral being 
so pronounced, as to fill my ear, and I feel ennobled by the offer of my utter- 
most action and passion? The test of the true faith, certainly, should be its 
power to charm and command the soul, as the laws of nature control the activ- 
ity of the hands, — so commanding that we find pleasure and honor in obeying. 
The faith should blend with the light of rising and of setting suns, with the 
flying cloud, the singing bird, and the breath of flowers. But now the priest's 
Sabbath has lost the splendor of nature; it is unlovely; we are glad when it is 
done; we can make, we do make, even sitting in our pews, a far better, holier, 
sweeter, for ourselves. 

Whenever the pulpit is usurped by a formalist, then is the wors*liipper 
defrauded and disconsolate. W'e shrink as soon as the prayers begin, which 
do not uplift, but smite and offend us. We are fain to wrap our cloaks about 
us, and secure, as best we can, a solitude that hears not. I once heard a 
preacher who sorely tempted me to say, I would go to church no more. Men 
go, thought I, where they are wont to go, else had no soul entered the temple 
in the afternoon. A snow storm was falling around us. The snow storm was 
real; the preacher merely spectral; and the eye felt the sad contrast in looking 
at him, and then out of the window behind him, into the beautiful meteor of 
the snow. He had lived in vain. He had no one word intimating that he 
had laughed or wept, was married or in love, had been commended, or cheated, 
or chagrined. If he had ever lived and acted, we were none the wiser for it. 
The capital secret of his profession, namely, to convert life into truth, he had 
not learned. Not one fact in all his experience had he vet imported into his 
doctrine. This man had ploughed, and planted, and talked, and l)ought, and 
sold; he had read books; he had eaten and drunken; his head aches; his heart 



THE SOUL'S PROVIDENCE. 485 

throbs; he smiles and suffers; yet was there not a surmise, a hint, in all the 
discourse, that he had ever lived at all. Not a line did he draw out of real 
history. The true preacher can be known by this, that he deals out to the 
people his life, — • life passed through the fire of thought. But of the bad 
preacher, it could not be told from his sermon, what age of the world he fell in; 
whether he had a father or a child; whether he was a freeholder or a pauper; 
whether he was a citizen or a countryman; or any other fact of his biography. 
It seemed strange that the people should come to church. It seemed as if 
their houses were very unentertaining, that they should prefer this thoughtless 
clamor. It shows that there is a commanding attraction in the moral senti- 
ment, that can lend a faint tint of light to dulness and ignorance, coming in its 
name and place. The good hearer is sure he has been touched sometimes; is 
sure there is somewhat to be reached, and some word that can reach it. When 
he listens to these vain words, he comforts himself by their relation to his 
remembrance of better hours, and so they clatter and echo unchallenged. 

I am not ignorant that when we preach unworthily, it is not always quite 
in vain. There is a good ear, in some men, that draws supphes to virtue out 
of very indifferent nutriment. There is poetic truth concealed in all the com- 
mon-places of prayer and of sermons, and though foolishly spoken, they may 
be wisely heard; for, each is some select expression that broke out in a moment 
of piety from some stricken or jubilant soul, and its excellency made it remem- 
bered. The prayers and even the dogmas of our church, are like the zodiac 
of Denderah, and the astronomical monuments of the Hindoos, wholly insulated 
from anything now extant in the life and business of the people. They mark 
the height to which the waters once rose. But this docility is a check upon 
the mischief from the good and devout. In a large portion of the community, 
the religious service gives rise to quite other thoughts and emotions. We need 
not chide the negligent serv^ant. We are struck with pity, rather, at the swift 
retribution of his sloth. Alas for the unhappy man that is called to stand in 
the pulpit, and not give bread of life. Everything that befalls, accuses him. 
Would he ask contributions for the missions, foreign or domestic? Instantly 
his face is suffused with shame, to propose to his parish, that they should 
send money a hundred or a thousand miles, to furnish such poor fare as they 
have at home, and would do well to go the hundred or the thousand miles to 
escape. Would he urge people to a godly way of living; — and can he ask a 
fellow-creature to come to Sabbath meetings, when he and the}^ all know what 
is the poor uttermost they can hope for therein? Will he invite them privately 
to the Lord's Supper? He dares not. If no heart warm this rite, the hollow, 
dry, creaking formality is too plain, than that he can face a man of wit and 



486 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

energy, and put the invitation without terror. In the street, what has he to 
say to the bold village blasphemer? The village blasphemer sees fear in the 
face, form, and gait of the minister. 

Let me not taint the sincerity of this plea by any oversight of the claims 
of good men. I know and honor the purity and strict conscience of numbers 
of the clergy. What life the public worship retains, it owes to the scattered 
company of pious men, who minister here and there in the churches, and who, 
sometimes accepting with too great tenderness the tenet of the elders, have not 
accepted from others, but from their own heart, the genuine impulses of virtue, 
and so still command our love and awe, to the sanctity of character. More- 
over, the exceptions are not so much to be found in a few eminent preachers, 
as in the better hours, the truer inspirations of all, — nay, in the sincere 
moments of every man. But with whatever exception, it is still true, that tra- 
dition characterizes the preaching of this country; that it comes out of the 
memory, and not ovit of the soul; that it aims at what is usual, and not at what 
is necessary and eternal; that thus, historical Christianity destroys the power 
of preaching, by withdrawing it from the exploration of the moral nature of 
man, where the sublime is, where are the resources of astonishment and power. 
What a cruel injustice it is to that Law, the joy of the whole earth, which 
alone can make thought dear and rich; that Law whose fatal sureness the 
astronomical orbits poorly emulate, that it is travestied and depreciated, that it 
is behooted and behowled. and not a trait, not a word of it articulated. The 
pulpit, in losing sight of this Law, loses its reason, and gropes after it knows 
not what. And for want of this culture, the soul of the community is sick and 
faithless. It wants nothing so much as a stern, high, stoical. Christian dis- 
cipline, to make it know itself and the divinity that speaks through it. Now 
man is ashamed of himself; he skulks and sneaks through the world, to be 
tolerated, to be pitied, and scarcely in a thousand years does any man dare to 
be wise and good, and so draw after him the tears and blessings of his 
kind. * * * 

And now, my brothers, you will ask, What in these desponding days can be 
done by us? The remedy is already declared in the ground of our complaint 
of the Church. We have contrasted the Church with the Soul. In the soul, 
then, let the redemption be sought. A\'herever a man comes, there comes 
revolution. The old is for slaves. When a man comes, all books are legible, 
all things transparent, all religions are forms. He is religious. Man is the 
wonder-worker. He is seen amid miracles. All men bless and curse. He saith 
yea and nay, only. The stationariness of religion; the assumption that the 
age of inspiration is past, that the Bible is closed; the fear of degrading the 



THE SOUL'S PROVIDENCE. 487 

character of Jesus by representing him as a man; indicate with sufficient clear- 
ness the falsehood of our theology!!! It is the office of a true preacher to 
show us that God is, not was; that he speaketh, not spake. The true Chris- 
tianity, — a faith like Christ's in the infinitude of man, — is lost. None believ- 
eth in the soul of man, but only in some man or person old and departed. Ah 
me! no man goeth alone. All men go in flocks to this saint or that poet, 
avoiding the God who seeth in secret. They cannot see in secret; they love 
to be blind in public. They think society wiser than their soul, and know 
not that one soul, and their soul, is wiser than the whole world. See how 
nations and races flit by on the sea of time, and leave no ripple to tell where 
they floated or sunk, and one good soul shall make the name of Moses, or of 
Zeno, or of Zoroaster, reverend forever. None assayeth the stern ambition to 
be the Self of the nation, and of nature, but each would be an easy secondary 
to some Christian scheme, or sectarian connection, or some eminent man. 
Once leave your own knowledge of God. your own sentiment, and take sec- 
ondary knowledge, as St. Paul's, or George Fox's, or Swedenborg's, and you 
get wide from God with every year this secondary form lasts, and if, as now, 
for centuries, — the chasm yawns to that breadth, that men can scarcely be 
convinced there is in them anything divine. 

Let me admonish you, first of all, to go alone; to refuse the good models, 
even those which are sacred in the imagination of men, and dare to love God 
without mediator or veil. Friends enough you shall find who will hold up to 
your emulation Wesleys and Oberlins, Saints and Prophets. Thank God for 
these good men, but say, " I also am a man." Imitation cannot go above its 
model. The imitator dooms himself to hopeless mediocrity. The inventor did 
it, because it was natural to him, and so in him it has a charm. In the imitator, 
something else is natural, and he bereaves himself of his own beauty, to come 
short of another man's. 

Yourself a newborn bard of the Holy Ghost, — cast behind you all con- 
formity, and acquaint men at first hand with Deity. Look to it first and only, 
that fashion, custom, authority, pleasure, and money, are nothing to you, — 
are not bandages over your eyes, that you cannot see, — but live with the 
privilege of the immeasurable mind. Not too anxious to visit periodically all 
families and each family in your parish connection, — when you meet one of 
these men or women, be to them a divine man; be to them thought and virtue; 
let their timid aspirations find in you a friend; let their trampled instincts be 
genially tempted out in your atmosphere; let their doubts know that you have 
doubted, and their wonder feel that you have wondered. By trusting your own 
heart, you shall gain more confidence in other men. For all our penny-wis- 



488 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

dom, for all our soul-destroying slavery to habit, it is not to be doubted, that 
all men have sublime thoughts; that all men value the few real hours of life; 
they love to be heard; they love to be caught up into the vision of principles. 
We mark with light in the memory the few interviews we have had, in the 
dreary years of routine and of sin, with souls that made our souls wiser; that 
spoke what we thought; that told us what we knew; that gave us leave to be 
what we inly were. Discharge to men the priestly office, and, present or 
absent, you shall be followed with their love as by an angel. * * * 

In such high communion, let us study the grand strokes of rectitude; a 
bold benevolence, an independence of friends, so that not the unjust wishes of 
those who love us, shall impair our freedom, but we shall resist for truth's sake 
the freest flow of kindness, and appeal to sympathies far in advance; and, — 
what is the highest form in which we know this beautiful element, — a certain 
solidity of merit, that has nothing to do with opinion, and which is so essen- 
tially and manifestly virtue, that it is taken for granted, that the right, the brave, 
the generous step will be taken by it, and nobody thinks of commending it. 
You would compliment a coxcomb doing a good act, but you would not 
praise an angel. The silence that accepts merit as the most natural thing in 
the world, is the highest applause. Such souls, when they appear, are the 
Imperial Guard of Virtue, the perpetual reserve, the dictators of fortune. One 
needs not praise their courage, — they are the heart and soul of nature. O my 
friends, there are resources in us on which we have not drawn. There are men 
who rise refreshed on hearing a threat; men to whom a crisis which intimi- 
dates and paralyzes the majority, — demanding not the faculties of prudence 
and thrift, but comprehension, immovableness, the readiness of sacrifice, — 
comes graceful and beloved as a bride. Napoleon said of Massena, that he 
was not himself until the battle began to go against him; then, when the dead 
began to fall in ranks around him, awoke his powers of combination, and he 
put on terror and victory as a robe. So it is in rugged crises, in unweariable 
endurance, and in aims which put sympathy out of question, that the angel 
is shown. But these are heights that we can scarce remember and look up to, 
without contrition and shame. Let us thank God that such things exist. 

And now let us do what we can to rekindle the smouldering, nigh- 
quenched fire on the altar. The evils of the church that now is are manifest. 
The question returns. What shall we do? I confess, all attempts to project 
and establish a Cultus with new rites and forms, seem to me vain. Faith 
makes us, and not we it, and faith makes its own forms. All attempts to con- 
trive a system are as cold as the new worship introduced by the French to the 
goddess of Reason, — to-day, pasteboard and filigree, and ending to-morrow 



THE SOUL'S PROVIDENCE. 



489 



in madness and murder. Rather let the breath of new Hfe be breathed by you 
through the forms already existing. For, if once you are alive, you shall find 
they shall become plastic and new. The remedy to their deformity is, first, 
soul, and second, soul, and evermore, soul. * * * Two inestimable ad- 
vantages Christianity has given us; first, the Sabbath, the jubilee of the whole 
world; whose light dawns welcome alike into the closet of the philosopher, 
into the garret of toil, and into prison cells, and everywhere suggests, even 
to the vile, the dignity of spiritual being. Let it stand forevermore, a temple, 
which new love, new faith, new sight shall restore to more than its first splen- 
dor to mankind. And secondly, the institution of preaching, — the speech of 
man to men, — essentially the most flexible of all organs, of all forms. What 
hinders that now, everywhere, in pulpits, in lecture-rooms, in houses, in fields, 
wherever the invitation of men or your own occasions lead you, you speak 
the very truth, as your life and conscience teach it, and cheer the waiting, 
fainting hearts of men with new hope and new revelation? 

I look for the hour when that supreme. Beauty, which ravished the souls 
of those Eastern men, and chiefly of those Hebrews, and through their lips 
spoke oracles to all time, shall speak in the West also. The Hebrew and 
Greek Scriptures contain immortal sentences, that have been bread of life to 
millions. But they have no epical integrity; are fragmentary; are not shown 
in their order to the intellect. I look for the new Teacher, that shall follow 
so far those shining, laws, that he shall see them come full circle; shall see 
their rounding complete grace; shall see the world to be the mirror of the 
soul; shall see the identity of the law of gravitation with purity of heart; and 
shall show that the Ought, that Duty, is one thing with Science, with Beauty, 
and with Joy. 

(Delivered before the Senior Class, Divinity College, Cambridge, Mass., July, 183S.) 




490 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



Capital Punishment. 

By EDWARD LIVINGSTON, of New York. 

(Born 1764, died 1836.) 



J- 




XISTENCE was the first gift of Omnipotence to man, — existence 
accompanied not only by the instinct to preserve it, and to perpetuate 
the species, but with a social (not merely a gregarious) disposition, 
which led so early to the formation of societies, that unless we 
carry our imagination back to the first created being, it is scarcely 
possible to imagine, and certainly impossible to trace, any other state 
than that of the social — it is found wherever men are found, and must have 
existed as soon as the number of the species were sulBciently multiplied to 
produce it. Man, then, being created for society, the Creator of man must 
have intended that it should be preserved; and as he acts by general laws, not 
by special interference (except in the cases which religion directs to believe), 
all primitive society, as well as the individuals of which it is composed, must 
have been endowed with certain natural rights and correspondent duties, 
anterior in time, and paramount in authority, to any that may be formed by 
mutual consent. The first of these rights, perhaps the only one that will not 
admit of dispute, is, as well on the part of the individual as of the society, the 
right to continue the existence given by God to man, and by the nature of 
man, to the social state in which he was formed to live; and the correspondent 
mutual duty of the individual and of the society is to defend this right; but 
when the right is given, the means to enforce it must, in natural as well as 
positive law, be admitted to be also given. If, then, both individuals and the 
society have the right to preserve their several existence, and are, moreover, 
under the reciprocal duty to defend it when attacked, it follows, that if one or 
the other is threatened with destruction, which cannot be averted but by 
taking the life of the assailant, the right, nay more, the duty to take it exists: 
the irresistible impulse of nature indicates the right she has conferred, and her 
first great law shows that life may be taken in self-defense. It is true the 
aggressor has the same right to exist; but if this right were sacred while he 
was attempting to destroy that of another there would be coexisting two equal 




Edward Livingston. 



492 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

and conflicting rights, which is a contradiction in terms. The right, there- 
fore, I speak of, is proved; but both in the individual and in society it is strictly 
defensive — it can only be exerted during that period when the danger lasts, 
by which I mean the question is, Which of the two shall exist, the aggressor 
or the party attacked, — whether this be an individual or the society? Before 
this crisis has arrived, or after it has passed, it is no longer self-defense and 
then their right to enjoy existence would be coexistent and equal, but not 
conflicting, and for one to deprive the other of it would be of course unjust. 

Therefore, the positions with which I set out seem to be proved. That 
the right to inflict death exists, but that it must be in defense, either of indi- 
vidual or social existence; and that it is limited to the case where no other 
alternative remains to prevent the threatened destruction. 

In order to judge whether there is any necessity for calling this abstract 
right into action, we must recollect the duty imposed upon society of protect- 
ing its members, derived, if we have argued correctly, from the social nature 
of man, independent of any implied contract. While we can imagine society 
to be in so rude and imperfect a state as to render the performance of this duty 
impossible without taking the life of the aggressor, we must concede the right. 
But is there any such state of society? Certainly none in the civilized world, 
and our laws are made for civilized man. Imprisonment is an obvious and 
effectual alternative; therefore, in civilized society, in the usual course of events, 
Ave can never suppose it necessary, and of course never lawful; and even among 
the most savage hordes, where the means of detention might be supposed 
wanting — banishment, for the most part, would take away the necessity of 
inflicting death. An active imagination, indeed, might create cases and situa- 
tions in which the necessity might possibly exist; but if there are any such, 
and they are sufficiently probable to justify an exception in the law, they should 
be stated as such, and they would then confirm the rule. But, by a perversity 
of reasoning in those who advocate this species of punishment, they put the 
exception in the place of the rule, and, what is worse, an exception of which 
the possibility is doubtful. 

It may be observed, that I have taken the preservation of life as the only 
case in which even necessity could give the right to take life, and that for the 
simple reason, that this is the only case in which the two natural rights of 
equal importance can be balanced; and in which the scale must preponderate 
in favor of him who endeavors to destroy. The only true foundation for the 
right of inflicting death, is the preservation of existence. This gift of our 
Creator seems, by the universal desire to preserve it which he hns infu'^ed into 
every part of his animal creation, to be intended as the only one which he 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 493 

did not intend to place at our disposal. But, it may be said, what becomes of 
our other rights? Are personal liberty, personal inviolability, and private 
property to be held at the will of any strong invader? How are these to be 
defended, if you restrain the right to take life to the single case of defense 
against an attack upon existence? To this it is answered: Society being a 
natural state, those who compose it have collectively natural rights. The first 
is that of preserving its existence; but this can only be done by preserving that 
of the individuals which compose it. It has, then, duties as well as rights; but 
these are wdsely ordered to be inseparable. Society cannot exert its right of 
self-preservation without, by the same act, performing its duty in the preser- 
vation of its members. Whenever any of those things which are the objects 
of the association, life, liberty, or property, are assailed, the force of the whole 
social body must be exerted for its preservation: and this collective force, in 
the case of an individual attack, must, in ordinary cases, be sufficient to repel 
it without the sacrifice of life; but in extraordinary cases, when the force of the 
assailants is so great as to induce them to persevere in a manner that reduces 
the struggle to one for existence, then the law of self-defense applies. 

But there may be a period in which individual rights may be injured 
before the associated power can interfere. In these cases, as the nature of 
society does not deprive the indivrdual of his rights, but only comes in to aid 
their preservation, he may defend .his person or property against illegal vio- 
lence by a force sufificient to repel that with which he is assailed. This results 
clearly from the right to property, to whatever source we may refer it; and 
from that of personal inviolability, which is (under certain restrictions imposed 
by nature itself) indubitably a natural right. As the injury threatened may 
not admit of compensation, the individual may use force to prevent the aggres- 
sion; and if that used by the assailant endangers his life, the question then 
again becomes one of self-defense, and the same reasoning applies which was 
used to show the right of taking life in that case. But where the individual 
attacked can, either by his own physical force, or by the aid of the society to 
which he belongs, defend himself or his property, — when the attack is not of 
such a nature as to jeopardize his own existence in the defense of them, — if 
he take the life of the aggressor, under these circumstances, he takes it with- 
out necessity, and consequently without right. This is the extent to which 
the natural law of self-defense allows an individual to go, in putting another 
to death. May any association of individuals inflict it for any other cause, 
and under any other circumstance? Society has the right only to defend that 
which the individuals who compose it have a right to defend, or to defend 
itself — that is to say, its own existence, and to destroy any individual, or any 



494 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

other society which shall attempt its destruction. But this, as in the case of 
individuals, must be only while the attempt is making, and when there is no 
other means to defeat it. And it is in that sense only that I understand the 
word so often used, so often abused, so little understood, — necessity. It exists 
between nations during war, or a nation and one of its component parts in a 
rebellion or insurrection, — between individuals during the moment of an 
attempt against life, which cannot otherwise be repelled; but between society 
and individuals, organized as the former now is, with all the means of repres- 
sion and self-defense at its command, never. I come then to the conclusion, 
in which I desire most explicitly to be understood, that although the right to 
punish with death might be abstractedly conceded to exist in certain societies, 
and under certain circumstances which might make it necessary, yet, com- 
posed as society now is, these circumstances cannot reasonably be even sup- 
posed to occur; that, therefore, no necessity, and of course no right, to inflict 
death as a punishment does exist. 

There is also great force in the reasonings which have been used to rebut 
that which founds the right to take life for crimes, on an original contract, 
made by individuals on the first formation of society: i. That no such con- 
tract is proved, or can be well imagined. 2. That if it were, it would be 
limited to the case of defense. The parties to such contract could only give to 
the society those rights which they individually had: their only right over 
the life of another is to defend their own. They can give that to society, and 
they can give no more. In this case also, therefore, the right resolves itself 
into that of doing what is necessary for preservation. The great inquiry then 
recurs. Is the punishment of death in any civilized society necessary, for the 
preservation either of the lives of its citizens individually, or of their social 
collective rights? If it be not necessary, I hope it has been proved not to be 
just; and if neither just nor necessary, can it be expedient? To be necessary, 
it must be shown that the lives of the citizens and the existence of society can- 
not be presen-ed without it. But can this be maintained in the face of so 
many proofs? Egypt, for twenty years, during the reign of Sabaco — Rome, 
for two hundred and fifty years — Tuscany, for more than twenty-five — Rus- 
sia, for twenty-one, during the reign of Elizabeth, — are so many proofs to the 
contrary. Nay, if those are right who tell you that the penal laws of Spain 
were abrogated by the transfer, this State (Louisiana) itself gives an unanswer- 
able proof that no such necessity exists; for if those laws were not in force, it 
is very clear that there were none imposing the penalty of death, from the 
time of the transfer, in December, 1803, to the 5th of May, 1805. when our 
first penal law was passed. Yet, during that period, when national prejudices 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 495 

ran high — when one Government had abandoned and the other had not yet 
estabhshed its authority, — there was not, I beheve, a single instance of murder, 
or of any attempt to destroy the order of society; so that one argument or the 
other must be given up. Either the Spanish laws existed, or we ourselves 
furnish a proof that a nation may exist, in peace, without the punishment of 
death. Societies have, then, existed without it. In those societies, therefore, 
it was not necessary. Is there anything in the state of ours that makes it so? 
It has not, as far as I have observed, been even suggested. But, if not abso- 
lutely necessary, have its advocates even the poor pretext that it is convenient, 
— that the crimes for which it is reserved diminish under its operation, in a 
greater proportion than those which incur a dififerent punishment? The reverse 
is the melancholy truth. Murder, and those attempts to murder which are 
capitally punished, have increased in some of the United States, to a degree 
that not only creates general alarm, but, by the atrocity with which they are 
perpetrated, fix a stain on the national character, which it will be extremely 
difficult to efface. I might rely, for this fact, on the general impression which 
every member of the body I address must have on this subject; but as the 
result is capable of being demonstrated by figures, I pray their attention to 
the tables annexed to this report, — in which, although they are far from being 
as complete as could be wished, they will see an increase of those crimes that 
demonstrates, if anything can do it, the inefficiency of the means adopted, and 
so strangely persisted in, of repressing them. The small number of execu- 
tions, compared with the well-authenticated instances of the crime, shows that 
the severity of the punishment increases the chance of acquittal; and the idle 
curiosity which draws so many thousands to witness the exhibition of human 
suffering at the executions — the levity with which the spectacle is beheld — 
demonstrates its demoralizing and heart-hardening effects, — while the crimes 
committed at the very moment of the example intended to deter from the com- 
mission, show how entirely ineffectual it is. One instance of this is so remark- 
able, that I cannot omit its detail. In the year 1822, a person, named John 
Lechler, was executed at Lancaster, in Pennsylvania, for an atrocious murder. 
The execution was, as usual, witnessed by an immense multitude; and of the 
salutary effect it had on their feelings and morals we may judge from the fol- 
lowing extract from a newspaper, printed in the neighborhood, — the material 
facts, which are stated in it, having been since confirmed to me, by unques- 
tionable authority : — 

" It has long," says the judicious editor, " been a controverted point, 
whether public executions, by the parade with which they are conducted, do 
not operate on the vicious part of the community more as incitements to, than 



496 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

examples deterring from, crime. What has taken place in Lancaster would 
lead one to believe, that the spectacle of a public execution produces less refor- 
mation than criminal propensity. While an old ofifense was atoned for, more 
than a dozen new ones were committed, and some of a capital grade. Twenty- 
eight persons were committed to jail, on Friday night, for divers offenses at 
Lancaster, such as murder, larceny, assault and battery, etc.; besides, many 
gentlemen lost their pocket-books, where the pickpockets escaped, or the jail 
would have overflowed. 

" In the evening, as one Thomas Burns, who was employed as a weaver 
in a factory, near Lancaster, was going home, he was met by one Wilson, with 
whom he had some previous misunderstanding; when Wilson drew a knife 
and gave him divers stabs, in sundry places, which are considered mortal. 
Wilson was apprehended and committed to jail, and had the same irons put 
on him which had scarcely been laid ofif long enough, by Lechler, to get cold." 

History presents to us the magic glass on which, by looking at past, we 
may discern future events. It is folly not to read; it is perversity not to follow 
its lessons. If the hemlock had not been brewed for felons in Athens, would 
the fatal cup have been drained by Socrates? If the people had not been 
familiarized to scenes of judicial homicide, would France or England have been 
disgraced by the useless murder of Louis or of Charles? If the punishment 
of death had not been sanctioned by the ordinary laws of those kingdoms, 
would the one have been deluged with the blood of innocence, of worth, of 
patriotism, and of science, in her revolution? Would the best and noblest lives 
of the other have been lost on the scaffold, in her civil broils? Would her 
lovely and calumniated queen, the virtuous Malesherbes, the learned Con- 
dorcet — would religion, personified in the pious ministers of the altar, courage 
and honor, in the host of high-minded nobles, and science, in its worthy repre- 
sentative, Lavoisier — would the daily hecatomb of loyalty and worth, — would 
all have been immolated by the stroke of the guillotine; or Russell and Sidney, 
and the long succession of victims of party and tyranny, by the axe? The 
fires of Smithfield would not have blazed, nor, after the lapse of ages, should 
we yet shudder at the names of St. Bartholomew, if the ordinary ecclesiastical 
law had not usurped the attributes of divine vengeance, and by the sacrilegious 
and absurd doctrine, that offenses against the Deity were to be punished with 
death, given a pretext to these atrocities. Nor, in the awful and mysterious 
scene on Mount Calvary, would that agony have been inflicted, if by the daily 
sight of the cross, as an instrument of justice, the Jews had not been prepared 
to make it one of their sacrilegious rage. But there is no end of the exam- 
ples which crowd upon the memory, to show the length to which the exercise 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 497 

of this power, by the law, has carried the dreadful abuse of it, under the sem- 
blance of justice. Every nation has wept over the graves of patriots, heroes, 
and martyrs, sacrificed by its own fury. Every age has had its annals of 
blood. 

But not to resort to the danger of the examples in times of trouble and 
dissension, advert once more to that which was formerly urged, and to which 
I must again hereafter return — that which attends its regular practice in 
peace — the irremediable nature of this punishment, when error, popular preju- 
dice^ or false or mistaken testimony, has caused its infliction to be ordered upon 
the innocent, — a case by no means of so rare occurrence as may be imagined. 
It is not intended to enter into a detail of those which I have myself collected; 
they are not few, although they must necessarily bear a small proportion to 
those which were not within my reach. The author of a book of high author- 
ity, on evidence, has brought together several cases which are well authenti- 
cated. In France, in the short space of one year, I have gathered from the 
public papers that seven cases occurred, in which persons condemned to death 
by the primary courts and assizes, have been acquitted by the sentence of a 
superior tribunal, on a reversal of the sentence. In other States of our Union, 
these cases are not uncommon. With us the organizations of our courts pre- 
vent the correction of any error, either in law, or in fact, by a superior tribunal. 
But everywhere it is matter of surprise that any cases should be discovered of 
these fatal mistakes. The unfortunate subjects of them are, for the most part, 
friendless; generally their lives must have been vicious, or suspicion would not 
have fastened on them; and men of good character sometimes think it disrepu- 
table to show an interest for such men, or to examine critically into the cir- 
cumstances of their case. They are deserted by their connections, if they have 
any, — friends they have none. They are condemned — executed — forgotten ; 
and in a few days it would seem that the same earth which covered their bodies 
has buried all remembrance of them, and all doubts of their innocence or guilt. 
It is, then, not unreasonable to suppose, that many more such cases have 
existed than those that have fortuitously been brought to light. Would you 
retain a punishment that, in the common course of events, must be irremediably 
inflicted, air times, on the innocent, even if it secured the punishment of the 
guilty? But that is far from being the effect. While you cannot, in particular 
cases, avoid its falling upon innocence, that very cause, from the imperfection 
of all testimony, will make it more favorable to the escape of the guilty; and 
the maxim, so often quoted on this occasion, will no longer be perverted in 
order to effect a compromise between the conscience of the juror and the 
severity of the law, when your punishments are such only as admit of remission 
when they have been found to be unjustly imposed. 



498 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

Other arguments, not less forcible, — other authorities, equally respectable, 
— mig-ht be adduced to show the ill effects of this species of punishment; but 
the many topics that are still before me, in this report, oblige me to pursue 
this one no further than to inquire, what good can be expected, or what present 
advantage is derived from retaining this punishment? Our legislation surren- 
dered it without a struggle, in all cases, at first, but murder, attempt to murder, 
rape, and servile insurrection; and afterwards extended it to a species of aggra- 
vated burglary. Now, as these cases are those only in which it has been 
deemed expedient to retain this punishment, — as it has been abandoned in all 
others, — the serious inquiry presents itself, why it was retained in these, or 
why abandoned in the others? Its inefficiency, or some of the other objec- 
tions to it, must have been apparent in all the other numerous offenses in which 
it has been dispensed with, or it would certainly have been retained, or restored, 
Taking this acknowledged inefficiency, in the numerovis cases, for the basis of 
the argument, let us inquire whether there is anything which makes it peculiarly 
adapted to the enumerated crimes, which it is unjust or inexpedient to apply 
to any of the others? We have three modes of discovering the triUh on this 
subject: by reasoning from the general effects of particular motives on human 
actions; by analogy, or judging from the effects in one case to the probable 
effects in another; or by experience of the effect on the particular case. The 
general reasoning upon the justice and efificacy of the punishment will not be 
repeated here, but it is referred to as being conclusive as to all offenses, and 
admitting of no exceptions that would apply to murder, or either of the three 
other cases in which our laws inflict it. If we reason from analogy, we should 
say the only argument ever used in favor of death as a punishment is, that 
the awful example it presents will deter from the commission of the offense; 
but by your abandonment of it in all cases but these, you acknowledge it has 
no efficacy there. Analogy, therefore, would lead us to the conclusion, that 
if it was useless in the many cases, it would be so in the few. But it is acknowl- 
edged that no analogy, or any other mode of reasoning, — no theory, however 
plausible, — ought to influence, when contradicted by experience. You have 
tried this remedy, and found it ineffectual! The crimes to which you have 
applied it are decreasing, in number and atrocity, under its influence! If so, 
it would be imprudent to make any change, even under the most favorable 
prospects that the new system would be equally efficient. Let us try it by 
this test. For the first three years after the transfer of the province, there was 
not a single execution or conviction for either of these crimes. In the course, 
however, of the first six years, four Indians, residing within the limits of the 
State, made an attack on some of the settlers, and were either given up by 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. ' 499 

the tribe, or arrested and condemned; and two were executed as for murder, 
and one negro was condemned and executed for insurrection. In the next 
six years there were ten convictions; in the succeeding four, to the month 
of January, 1822, fourteen; — so that we find the number of convictions 
for the enumerated crimes have nearly doubled in every period of six 
years, in the face of this efficient penalty. But the population of the State 
doubles only once in twenty years; therefore the increase of this crime progresses 
in a ratio of three to one to that of the population; and we should not forget, 
in making this calculation, the important and alarming fact, that numerous 
instances of homicide, and attempts to kill, occur, which are rarely followed 
by prosecution, and more rarely still by conviction. 

We have seen a deliberate murder committed in the very crowd assembled 
to enjoy the spectacle of a murderer's death; and do we still talk of its force 
as an example? In defiance of your menaced punishment, homicide stalks 
abroad and raises its bloody hand, at noonday, in your crowded streets; and, 
when arrested in its career, takes shelter under the example of your laws, and , 
is protected, by their very severity, from punishment. Try the efficacy of 
milder punishments; they have succeeded. Your own statutes, — all those of 
every State in the Union, — prove that they have succeeded, in other offenses; 
try the great experiment on this also. Be consistent; restore capital punish- 
ment in other crimes, or abolish it in this. Do not fear that the murderers 
from all quarters of the earth, seduced by the mildness of your penal code, will 
choose this as the theatre of their exploits. On this point we have a 
most persuasive example. In Tuscany, as we have seen, neither murder 
nor any other crime was punished with death, for more than twenty 
years, during which time we have not only the official declaration of 
the sovereign, that " all crimes had diminished, and those of an atrocious nature 
had become extremely rare," but the authority of the venerable Franklin for 
these conclusive facts; that in Tuscany, where murder was not punished with 
death, only five had been committed in twenty years, — while in Rome, where 
that punishment is inflicted with great pomp and parade, sixty murders were 
committed in the short space of three months, in the city and its vicinity. " It 
is remarkable," he adds to this account, " that the manners, principles, and 
religion of the inhabitants of Tuscany and of Rome are exactly the same. 
The abolition of death alone, as a punishment for murder, produced this differ- 
ence in the moral character of the two nations." From this it would appear, 
rather that the murderers of Tuscany were invited, by the severe punishments 
in the neighboring territories of Rome, than that those of Rome were attracted 
into Tuscany by their abohtion. We have nothing to apprehend, then, from this 



500 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

measure; and if any ill effects should follow the experiment, it is but too easy 
to return to the system of extermination. 

One argument, — the ferocious character impressed on the people by this 
punishment, which was insisted on in the first report, — has been so strongly 
illustrated by a subsequent event in Pennsylvania, that I cannot omit stating it. 
After the execution of Lechler had gratified the people about York and Lan- 
caster with the spectacle of his death, and had produced its proper complement 
of homicide and other crimes, a poor wretch was condemned to suffer the same 
fate, for a similar offense, in another part of the State, where the people had 
not yet been indulged with such a spectacle. They, also, collected by thousands 
and tens of thousands. The victim was brought out. All the eyes, in the 
living mass that surrounded the gibbet, were fixed on his countenance; and 
they waited, with strong desire, the expected signal for launching him into 
eternity. 

There was a delay. They grew impatient. It was prolonged, and they 
were outrageous: cries like those which precede the tardy rising of the curtain, 
in a theatre, were heard. Impatient for the delight they expected in seeing a 
fellow-creature die, they raised a ferocious cr}'. But when it was at last 
announced that a reprieve had left them no hope of witnessing his agonies, 
their fury knew no bounds; and the poor maniac, for it was discovered that 
he was insane, was with difficulty snatched, by the officers of justice, from 
the fate which the most violent among them seemed determined to inflict. 
This is not an overcharged picture; the same savage feeling has been more 
than once exhibited in different parts of the Union, and will always be pro- 
duced by public executions, unless it is replaced by the equally dangerous 
feeling of admiration and interest for the sufferer. Which of the two is to 
prevail, depends on circumstances totally out of the power of the lawgiver or 
the judge to foresee, or control; but, by the indulgence of either feeling, every 
good end of punishment is totally defeated. 

I cannot, I ought not to dismiss this subject, without once more pressing 
on the most serious consideration of the Legislature, an argument which every 
new view of it convinces me is important, and, if we listen to the voice of 
conscience, conclusive, — the irremediable nature of this punishment. Until 
men acquire new faculties, and are enabled to decide upon innocence or guilt 
without the aid of fallible and corruptible human evidence, so long will the risk 
be incurred of condemning the innocent. Were the consequence felt as deeply 
as it ought to be, would there be an advocate for that punishment which, applied 
in such case, has all the consequences of the most atrocious murder to the 
innocent sufferers, — worse than the worst murderer! He stabs, or strikes, or 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 501 

poisons, and the victim dies,— he dies unconscious of the blow, without being 
made a spectacle to satisfy ferocious curiosity, and without the torture of leav- 
ing his dearest friends doubtful of his innocence, or seeing them abandon him 
under the conviction of his guilt. He dies, and his death is like one of those 
inevitable chances to which all mortals are subject. His family are distressed, but 
not dishonored; his death is lamented by his friends, and, if his life deserved 
it, honored by his country. But the death inflicted by the laws, — the murder 
of the innocent under its holy forms, — has no such mitigating circumstances. 
Slow in its approach, uncertain in its stroke, its victim feels not only the sick- 
ness of the heart that arises from the alternation of hope and fear, until his 
doom is pronounced; but when that becomes inevitable, — alone, the tenant of 
a dungeon during every moment that the lenity of the law prolongs his life, — 
he is made to feel all those anticipations, worse than a thousand deaths. The 
consciousness of innocence, that which is our support under other miseries, is 
here converted into a source of bitter anguish, when it is found to be no 
protection from infamy and death; and when the ties which connected him to 
his country, his friends, his family, are torn asunder, no consoling reflection 
mitigates the misery of that moment. He leaves unmerited infamy to his 
children; a name stamped with dishonor to their surviving parent, and bows 
down the gray heads of his own with sorrow to the grave. As he walks from 
his dungeon, he sees the thousands who have come to gaze on his last agony: 
he mounts the fatal tree, and a life of innocence is closed by a death of dishonor. 
This is no picture of the imagination. Would to God it were! Would to 
God that, if death must be inflicted, some sure means might be discovered of 
making it fall upon the guilty. These things have happened. These legal 
murders have been committed! and who were the primary causes of the crime? 
Who authorized a punishment which, once inflicted, could never be remitted 
to the innocent? Who tied the cord, or let fall the axe upon the guiltless 
head? Not the executioner, the vile instrument who is hired to do the work 
of death, — not the jury who convict, or the judge who condemns, — not the 
law which sanctions these errors; but the legislators who made the law, — 
those who, having the power, did not repeal it. These are the persons respon- 
sible to their country, their consciences, and their God. These horrors not 
only have happened, but they must be repeated: the same causes will produce 
the same effects. The innocent have sufifered the death of the guilty: the inno- 
cent will sufifer. We know it. The horrible truth stares us in the face. We 
dare not deny, and cannot evade it. A word, while it saves the innocent, 
will secure the punishment of the guilty; and shall we hesitate to pronounce it? 
Shall we content ourselves with our own imagined exemption from this fate, 



502 MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 

and shut our ears to the cries of justice and humanity? Shall " sensibility (as 
has been finely observed) sleep in the lap of luxury," and not awake at the 
voice of wretchedness? I urge this point with more earnestness, because I 
have witnessed more than one condemnation under false instructions of law, or 
perjured, or mistaken testimony; — sentences that would now have been 
reversed, if the unfortunate sufiferers were within the reach of mercy. I have 
seen, in the gloom and silence of the dungeon, the deep concentrated expression 
of indignity which contended with grief; have heard the earnest asseverations 
of innocence, made in tones which no art could imitate; and listened with awe 
to the dreadful adjuration, poured forth by one of these victims, with an energy 
and solemnity that seemed superhuman, summoning his false accuser and his 
mistaken judge to meet him before the throne of God. Such an appeal to the 
high tribunal which never errs, and before which he who made it was in a few 
hours to appear, was calculated to create a belief of his innocence: that belief 
was changed into certainty. The perjury of the witness was discovered, and 
he fled from the infamy that awaited him; but it was too late for any other 
eftect, than to add one more example to the many that preceded it of the 
danger, and I may add impiety, of using this attribute of the divine power, 
without the infallibility that can alone properly direct it. And this objection 
alone, did none of the other cogent reasons against capital punishment exist, — 
this alone would make me hail the decree for its abolition as an event, so honor- 
able to my country, and so consoling to humanity, as to be cheapl}' purchased 
by the labor of a life. 

I cannot quit this part of the subject without submitting to the general 
assembly the opinion of one whose authority would justify an experiment even 
more hazardous than this, but whose arguments are as convincing as his name 
is respectable. They are not the opinions of one whom the cant, which is used 
to cover the ignorance of the day, would call a theorist, but a man whose 
whole life was spent in the useful and honorable functions of the highest magis- 
tracy, whose name is always mentioned with reverence, and whose doctrines 
are quoted as authority, wherever the true principles of legal knowledge are 
regarded. Hear the venerable D'Aguesseau: — 

" Who would believe that a first impression may sometimes decide the 
question of life and death? A fatal mass of circumstances, which seem as if 
hit had collected them together, for the ruin of an unfortunate wretch, — a 
crowd of mute witnesses, (and from that character more dangerous) — depose 
against innocence: they prejudice the judge; his indignation is roused; his zeal 
contributes to seduce him. Losing the character of the judge in that of the 
accuser, he looks only to that which is evidence of guilt, and he sacrifices to 



CAPITAL PUNISHMENT. 503 

his own reasonings the man whom he would have saved had he listened 
only to the proofs of the law. An unforeseen event sometimes shows that 
innocence has sunk under the weight of conjectures, and falsifies the conclu- 
sions which circumstances had induced the magistrate to draw. Truth lifts up 
the veil with which probability had enveloped her; but she appears too late! 
The blood of the innocent cries aloud for vengeance against the prejudice of 
his judge; and the magistrate passes the rest of his life deploring a misfortune 
which his repentance cannot repair." 

The earnestness for this reform is sometimes reproached to its advocate/ 
as proceeding from a childish fear, that magnifies the apprehension of that 
which we know is appointed to us all. Not so. The value of life is not over- 
rated in the argument. There are occasions in which the risk of its loss must 
be incurred; in which the certainty of death must be encountered with firm- 
ness and composure. These occasions are presented by patriotism, in defense 
of our country and our country's rights, — by benevolence, in the rescue of 
another from danger, — by religion, whenever persecution offers the martyr's 
crown to the faithful; and it is not known, or believed, that those who propose 
to abolish death as a punishment either fear it as a natural event, or shun its 
encounter when required by duty, more than those who think it ought to be 
retained. He who preserved the life of a Roman citizen was entitled to a more 
honorable recompense than the daring soldier who ventured his own, by first 
mounting the breach. The civic was preferred to the mural crown. The 
Romans, during the best period of their history, reduced this abolition to 
practice. " Far," said their great orator, endeavoring, in a corrupted age, to 
restore the ancient feeling on the subject, — " far from us be the punishment 
of death — its ministers — its instruments. Remove them, not only from their 
actual operation on our bodies, but banish them from our eyes, our ears, our 
thoughts; for, not only the executions, but the apprehension, the existence, the 
very mention of these things, is disgraceful to a freeman and a Roman citizen." 
Yet the Romans were not very remarkable for a pusillanimous fear of death. 
In the age of which I speak, they did not want the excitement of capital pun- 
ishment to induce them to die for their country. On the contrary, it might, 
perhaps, be plausibly argued, that the servile disposition, which disgraced the 
latter ages of the republic, was in some measure caused by the change, which 
made the sacrifice of life the expiation for crime, instead of the consummation 
and proof of patriotic devotion. 

Conscious of having been guilty of much repetition, and certain that I 
have weakened, by my version of them, arguments much better used by others, 
I am yet fearful of having omitted many things that might have an effect in 



504 



MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ELOQUENCE. 



convincing any one of those to whom this report is addressed. The firm 
religious behef I have of the truth of the doctrine I advance, contrasted with 
the sense of my incapacity to enforce it upon others, must have produced 
obscurity where the interests of humanity require there should be light, and 
confusion where the performance of my great duty demands order. But the 
truth will appear in spite of these obstacles. From the midst of the cloud, with 
which human imperfections has surrounded her, her voice, like that of the 
Almighty from the Mount, will be heard reiterating to nations, as well as to 
individuals, the great command, " Thou shalt not kill." 





i 



